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Published on 10 January 2019 |
by Jesper Berggreen
10 January 2019 of Jesper Berggreen
This week SolarPlaza has launched a live monitor of all European blockchain projects in the energy sector. Under the name Blockchain2Energy Europe Solarplaza hosts the third conference focused on the practical and current applications of blockchain in the energy sector. It is scheduled for 13 February in Amsterdam.
An interactive map helps provide an overview of the whole energy project in Europe that embraces blockchain technology in some controversial way. From the presentation of the map:
In the wake of cryptocurrencies, interest in blockchain technology peaked at the end of 2017, spreading to oil spills on newspapers and websites for weeks, all of which reported on its seemingly unlimited potential to destroy all industries, including the energy sector. Blockchain start-ups, pilot projects and ICOs (first coin offers) appeared almost every day. In the energy sector alone, we have identified over 150 projects using blockchain.
But just as the increase in interest in the blockchain followed the curves of the cryptocurrencies, so did the fall. At the time of writing, the total capitalization of the cryptocurrency market is only 16% compared to exactly twelve months earlier. Similarly, Google Trends shows that the interest in blockchain as a search query is only 15% of what it was a year ago.
However, blockchain could effectively still contain the most promising features to truly enable the energy transition. Since this may be a rather complex subject to understand, I contacted Thomas Boersma, project manager of Solarplazato give me a little bit of head-to-head on all this. How, all this refers to the daily energy supply:
Thomas Boersma
Well, it is not so much the energy supply based on the blockchain, but more a digital tool that allows some incremental improvements in the energy sector (I do not think that interrupts the energy sector as much as some think, which I explain in this blog post). But blockchain is basically nothing but a ledger with some improved features, which increase trust and cyber security and allow automation of certain processes through smart contracts. Especially for monitoring (through supply chains, for example) or transactions, this is useful. So the most obvious use case is the peer-to-peer energy trade (which is not possible in most countries due to regulation). Here the blockchain functions as the registry that tracks kWh transactions and transactions. The positive aspect of the blockchain is that there is no "need for an intermediary", which in this case would be the utility, just connect all the counters and smart devices to the blockchain, which records everything in one sure way. The same applies for example to EV charging. If you reduce a bit and allow several parties to exchange energy, the blockchain can be the base level for the (local) energy markets, e.g. used to exchange flexibility. Another case of pleasant use is the renewable energy certificate, which prevents double spending and allows the trade of these over the blockchain. As soon as a kWh is produced, it is recorded on the blockchain, thus obtaining its own identity. This makes this kWh traceable throughout its life, avoiding double spending.
It seems simple enough. However, I'm still a bit in the dark about how the utilities will embrace it. It seems to me that it is more profitable for them to continue to send me an account that is desperate to understand that I only pay with a deep sigh. I have solar panels, but even if I want to sell a few kWh to my neighbor, the cable owner in the streets can still tear me away. So, I asked Thomas to work out:
Also I am not a supporter of the blockchain and rather skeptical. I think for the utilities the potential of the blockchain is not so much in consumer billing but rather in trading on the capacity market. For example. EDF has experimented with trading on Electrons' blockchain platform. On the old legacy system it takes about 5 days, while the new system takes only a few milliseconds. This kind of efficiency gains will eventually be beneficial on the account (I hope). And the owner of the cables in the street (often the DSO (semi-state) distribution (distribution system operators) have only one task and this is keeping the network reliable, if they can prevent them from needing to put more cables into the land allowing you to trade with your neighbor, this is probably the cheapest option for them: in the Netherlands Stedin is already doing a pilot on this (to Hoog Dalem). The problem is not so great now, but if in a street five people win the lottery and buy a Tesla, they are in trouble, so if the EVs become more widely adopted and do not prepare for this from these types of pilots, they will have to put more cables in the ground, and this is almost always the option more expensive (and at the end we pay for this).
OK understood. So, check Blockchain2Energy if you want to know more about blockchain energy applications in action.
About the author
Jesper Berggreen Jesper had his perspective on the world expanded tremendously after attending primary school in rural Africa at the start of the 1980s. And while educating a computer programmer and a lab technician, working with computers and laboratory robots at the forensic institute in Aarhus, Denmark, he never forgets what life is like without having anything. Thus it became evident to him that technological progress is necessary for the prosperity of all mankind, sharing this unique vessel that we call planet earth. However, technology must be intelligent, clean, sustainable, widely accessible and democratic to change the world for the better. By writing about clean energy, electric transport, energy poverty and related problems, it transmits the message to anyone who wants to know more. Jesper is the founder of Lifelike.dk.
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