Top 11 ReFi Projects on Solana 🌱
Top of the morning folks!
Numa here, ReFi eco-system builder and founder at Coral Tribe. Every day I feel inspired by purpose-driven founders paving the way in solving our world’s biggest problems. The shared goal is to design systems which regenerate our planet & bring prosperity to people. Given our uncertain future, ReFi seems more important than ever.
I am also excited to announce the new ReFi Solana Dashboard - built in collaboration with ReFi DAO to map top people, projects, events, content & more. Go check it out and submit your votes! 👇
But first, let's explore ReFi on Solana and our selection of top 11 projects
ReFi on Solana
Regenerative finance (ReFi) is an energetic and rapidly growing movement to create organizations in alignment with People & Planet. The Solana ecosystem is committed to this new wave of finance and is a growing hub for new projects.
Solana is a web-scale blockchain that is fast, secure and energy efficient. The system currently supports 4000 transactions per second and fees remain less than $0.01. With zero net carbon impact, Solana is the perfect candidate to build regenerative systems. From reforestation initiatives to blue economy investing, the top 11 Solana ReFi projects covered in this article are not just pipe dreams but have already achieved fantastic accomplishments:
Whether you're an investor looking for ethical investment opportunities or simply interested in learning more about sustainable solutions, these projects are sure to inspire you. Let's dive in 👇
1) GainForest 🍃
Imagine a world where stewardship of nature can be verified with radical transparency, and stewards are fairly rewarded for their work. That is the future GainForest is helping to unlock. Founded by David Dao and Simge Steen, Gainforest creates trust in nature-based donations and investment with a platform that combines the latest technology of our time - satellite imagery, drones, machine learning and more, to measure, report and verify conservation efforts. Conservation projects around the world are funded through their platform - and funds are disbursed only when conservation milestones are reached.
Gain Forest has various pilot projects around 3 continents and recently completed a mangrove conservation pilot in the Philippines. Make sure to visit their website and discover all the incredible nature-based projects. 👇
2) Eco-token 🌿
EcoToken is a launch pad for sustainable projects and an environmental credit producer and seller. Founded by James Bettauer and Randy Christie, the project addresses the funding gap for localised impact-driven projects by rewarding those who fund them. Grassroots communities working for the planet's betterment lack a business case and funding, ecoToken solves this problem by allowing users to pre-fund upcoming projects.
3) Water DAO 💧
An off-shoot of the ecoToken ecosystem, Water DAO is a decentralized platform that leverages the Solana and Regen Ledger blockchains to address the growing challenges of water scarcity and resource management. Their verifiable water credit methodology can be issued to qualified projects and reward clean water producers. This encourages responsible consumption and investments in water infrastructure by incentivizing responsible consumption. The platform uses a token-based system to facilitate the creation of credits, which represent a specific volume of water or water-related services.
4) Sunrise Stake ☀️
Founded by Daniel Kelleher, Sunrise Stake empowers users to direct blockchain staking rewards to offsetting greenhouse gas emissions or send donations directly to impact projects taking regenerative action on the ground. Simply by just staking Solana, token holders fund carbon mitigation projects worldwide - it has never been easier to make a positive impact!
5) STEPN 👟
Founded by Jerry H, STEPN is an awe-inspiring game that encourages a healthy lifestyle, combats climate change, and fosters community. Equipped with NFTs in the form of sneakers, users can earn game currency by walking, jogging, or running outdoors. This currency can be used in-game or cashed out for profit. In addition, they’ve partnered with Nori, where a portion of STEPN's profit is used to buy blockchain-based carbon removals.
Having reached over 250K community members, STEPN is an excellent example of how technology can be used to incentivize positive behaviour and make a real impact on our environment.
6) Deentra ⚡
Deentra makes investing in sustainable energy accessible and profitable. Founded by Mauro, Davide, and Federico Bonomi, the platform brings together people and companies interested in building new photovoltaic plants, connecting investors looking to directly finance the construction of these. By purchasing NFTs on Deentra, investors can contribute to the creation of these plants and share the earnings generated from the energy they produce. So far they've released a story-driven NFT collection and built a vibrant community around their upcoming product launch coming soon 👀
7) Enrex 🌳
Enrex is a protocol that connects decentralized finance (DeFi) to regulated environmental markets, allowing businesses to offset carbon emissions and achieve carbon neutrality. Founded by Vytautas Sabaliauskas, the project has built solutions to assist Web2 and Web3 companies become greener in their business, from offsetting website hosting impacts, to NFT collections and much more. They also have a free tool that enables businesses to generate sustainability goals.
8) Atlantis 🔱
Founded by Irthu Suresh and Nakul Reddy, Atlantis is a peer-to-peer impact network that helps builders, entrepreneurs, and creators in the climate and social impact sectors set up, measure, and verify the impact of their projects. So far they've worked with incredible projects like Hydrop, which decentralises water access and security in Bangalore. In addition, they supported the organization of the Green Pill Festival fostering the connections of like-minded builders in the ecosystem.
9) De_Plan 🗺️
Founded by Akshay Aditya, the high-tech team at De_Plan builds products that bridge the Web3 and IRL gap while providing solutions for ReFi builders - allowing apps to be built on top of their infrastructure. Their collective of planners, environmentalists, and urbanists have built Proto - a spatial data registry and location protocol, and Ostrom - a community-based development solution for land regeneration.
10) Single Earth 🌲
Single.Earth is an awe-inspiring Estonian company developing scalable business models to support nature preservation. Founded by Merit Valdsalu, and led by a high-performing team that raised $7.9M in Venture Capital in 2021 to deliver their vision, they've developed an approach to incentivize natural resource preservation and reward stakeholders that actively participate in sustainable land management. With their toolkit, business owners can positively impact the environment, while landowners earn income for preserving biodiversity in their forests. They use in-house tools like satellite data and machine learning models to assess the land's ecological characteristics.
11) Coral Tribe 🌊
Founded by Christian Chegne, Jimmy Lane, Adolfo Casabal & Avery Schwarz, Coral Tribe aims to expand access to capital for impact-driven businesses globally. Through NFTs and DeFi, they are making impact investing fun, accessible and engaging. Their vibrant NFT community is passionate about art, technology, and environmental action. Together they've helped plant 2000 corals across several continents and aided the development of one of the world's largest Web3 environmentally-focused brands. Now, with their upcoming ReeFi Hub platform, retail investors will be able to invest in expertly curated impact-focused oppertuntites.
An Exciting Future for ReFi ✨
The sustainable technology space is full of innovation and creativity. Each one of these exciting projects is solving important problems and contributing to a more sustainable, just, and prosperous world. We are proud to highlight their work and excited to see what they will achieve in the future.
Stay tuned for part 2... 👀
Getting Involved with Solana ReFi
It is fantastic to see such a strong foundation for the diverse Solana ReFi ecosystem we have today. Thank you to all the pioneering projects here and the amazing teams behind them, and big thanks to the Solana Foundation for all the work and resources aimed at growing this beautiful ReFi eco-system. We’re excited to welcome upcoming projects and support them entering the scene in this ever-evolving world of ReFi.
Follow ReFi DAO and Numa for more ecosystem updates and get more involved by joining the Solana ReFi telegram group and network with other founders and contributors. We host bi-weekly community calls and events.
Peace ✌️