Earlier this year, the Energy Web Foundation shared their release of several major milestones for blockchain technology in the energy sector, including expansion of their affiliate network, release of the EW Origin Decentralized Application (DApp), launch of their online community and a preview of the D3A simulation environment for blockchain based transactive energy grids.
Their testnet beta release was also enhanced with web assembly integration, encrypted smart contracts, and decentralized Proof-of-Authority governance.
EWF Council Member, Jon Creyts said, in a statement at that time, “As the EWF ecosystem begins to scale, we’ve built a critical mass of energy companies, blockchain developers, and other stakeholders who can together take definitive steps toward a more decentralized, democratized, decarbonized, and resilient electricity grid. Energy blockchain is at a powerful inflection point from hype and theory to practical proof of its potential.”
The EWF will work with on a new collaborative development alliance with Windmill Enterprise and Alternative Resource Group (ARG) for the development and deployment of an AR3 enterprise-class, blockchain-based microgrid power management and energy trading exchange platform utilizing the Cognida platform and network, according to an announcement from Windmill and ARG.
This moves the EWF one step closer to lowering costs for the alternative energy industry, with greater efficiencies and transparency between buyers and generators using decentralized applications based on their open-source reference framework.
The EWF counts among its strong community of members Duke Energy, Blockchain Capital, PG&E, Chubu Electric Power, Sempra Energy, Ericsson and dozens more supporting a market standard that “ensures interoperability, reduces costs and complexity, aligns currently dispersed blockchain initiatives, and facilitates technology deployment through easy-to-implement applications.”
“With the incorporation of distributed generation into the energy grid, there are increased complexities as more stakeholders become involved in coordination of energy production and delivery,” said Michael Hathaway, CEO of Windmill Enterprise. “The Cognida platform's use of blockchain technology as a distributed database provides tools for grid operators to enhance security and improve real-time exchange of data between stakeholders and their energy customers.”
“The evolution of the energy grid to a more dynamic, cleaner system is not a luxury, it is a necessity,” said Michael Lumbley, Partner and Development Director for ARG. “Technologies have evolved to provide better functionality, transparency and security. By bringing all of these aspects under a universal operating system, we can improve access to power and energy security to emerging markets.”
The AR3 platform will also allow end users to achieve even greater value through use of the Cognida Network’s COG token for transactions. In conjunction with the opportunity for ARG end users to be partial project owners through the AR3 token, energy consumers will now have the ability to be partial owner of their own energy supply and receive the additional savings of purchasing with the internal COG token, thereby lowering their cost of power significantly while supporting the development and deployment of clean energy assets around the globe.
The strategic alliance will focus on two major shared points of collaboration:
- Jointly implement, test and deploy the underlying application protocols and interfaces
- Cooperatively develop industry standards for the virtual purchase and sale of energy and energy-related products that make practical use of blockchain technology
This complements the EWF’s mission to build “a secure, transparent and expedient blockchain energy management and energy exchange platform that will allow end users and grid operators to buy, sell, trade or hedge energy assets anywhere in the global market with crypto or fiat currencies.”
Their AR3 platform will allow market participants to securely monetize their own energy production or procure energy from preferred resources with a secure identity management and verification system.
This will allow users to procure cleaner, lower-cost energy or monetize their production or clean energy credits. With a global market revenue of $1.4 trillion annually, this project will create an enormous market for energy producers and consumers.
One of the most exciting and meaningful Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) is applications associated with the growing renewable energy grid. There is the potential to manage, with sensors, solar panels, wind farms, water farms, and other generators while also measuring digital power meters.
IIoT systems for renewable energy includes applications from more accurate measurement and controls to predictive maintenance.
Given the reach of connected sensors - and the scale possible - securing the integrity of the data that systems generate and run off of is mission critical.
The IIoT is particularly good at distributed systems development and management, so fits perfectly with enterprise blockchain’s decentralized ledger, enabling zero-trust networks.
Edited by
Ken Briodagh
