Gaia Impact Fund
Gaia Impact Fund is a Paris-based impact venture capital firm that backs decentralized renewable-energy companies in emerging markets, mainly off-grid Africa and Southeast Asia. Its water exposure sits where solar meets water: solar-powered desalination and irrigation. As of 2026, (don't) Waste Water tracks 2 water companies in its portfolio and rates its water commitment Committed.
Compiled by Antoine Walter, (don't) Waste Water, from official filings and direct intelligence in Leviathan.
The take
Gaia Impact Fund is not a water fund, and that is the honest place to start reading it. Founded in Paris in 2017 by Hélène Demaegdt, who had earlier built the Synergie Solaire endowment fund, Gaia exists to finance decentralized renewable energy in the places the grid never reached, mostly off-grid sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia. Its product is solar electricity for people living with energy poverty, not water.
Water turns up at the edges of that solar thesis, where power and clean water are really the same problem. The two water companies (don't) Waste Water tracks in Gaia's portfolio are both solar-water plays. OSMOSUN builds battery-free, solar-powered desalination units that turn seawater and brackish water into drinking water, a company Gaia has backed as shareholder and board member since 2019 and that has since listed on Euronext Growth in Paris. Agros, a Southeast Asian agritech, puts solar water pumps in the hands of smallholder farmers so they can irrigate without diesel. The common thread is solar-powered water, not pipes or treatment plants.
In 2023 Gaia launched its second and larger vehicle, Gaia Energy Impact Fund II, alongside Capital Croissance, Schneider Electric and Investisseurs et Partenaires, reaching a 40 million euro first close. Classified Article 9 under Europe's sustainable-finance rules (the strictest, darkest-green impact category), the fund writes seed through Series B cheques into roughly twenty energy-access companies, mainly in Africa, run from Paris with an investment team on the ground in Nairobi. Water is a slice of that mandate, never the headline.
For a firm that would never call itself a water investor, Gaia keeps landing on the one insight I see again and again in the data: in a place with no grid, you cannot fix water until you fix power. A solar pump, a solar desalination skid, a mini-grid that also runs a borehole, that is the seam Gaia works, and it is exactly why a renewable-energy fund keeps surfacing in a water database.
Water Commitment Score
Compiled from official filings, third-party records, and direct intelligence from investors and founders, in Leviathan · recomputed monthly · as of Jun 2026.
How they invest
Portfolio · 2 water companies
Invests alongside
Highlighted = profiled on (don't) Waste Water.
Frequently asked
- What does Gaia Impact Fund invest in?
- Gaia Impact Fund invests in decentralized renewable energy, mostly solar, that brings electricity to off-grid communities and businesses in sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia. Its water exposure comes through the solar-water nexus: companies using solar power to desalinate seawater or pump water for irrigation rather than treating or piping it.
- Who runs Gaia Impact Fund?
- Gaia Impact Fund was founded in 2017 by Hélène Demaegdt, who chairs it as President and Founder. Managing Partner Victor Beulque runs the firm day to day, working with Partner Guilhem Dupuy, Nairobi-based Principal Muchiru Kuria and Investment Manager Marion Quenolle across the Paris and Kenya teams.
- Which water companies has Gaia Impact Fund backed?
- Gaia Impact Fund has backed two water companies tracked by (don't) Waste Water: OSMOSUN, which builds battery-free solar-powered desalination units for seawater and brackish water, and Agros, a Southeast Asian agritech whose solar water pumps let smallholder farmers irrigate without diesel. Both sit at the solar-water nexus.
- Where is Gaia Impact Fund based?
- Gaia Impact Fund is based in Paris, France, where it was founded in 2017, and runs an investment team on the ground in Nairobi, Kenya. The firm invests across emerging markets, primarily off-grid sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia, in decentralized renewable-energy companies.
- Is Gaia Impact Fund the same as the GAIA Climate Loan Fund?
- No. Gaia Impact Fund is a Paris-based impact venture capital firm founded in 2017 that backs decentralized renewable energy in emerging markets. The GAIA Climate Loan Fund is a separate, much larger debt vehicle managed by Climate Fund Managers. They are different firms that happen to share the Gaia name.