Asset logging in the energy sector: a scalable blockchain-based data platform

Abstract

Due to a steeply growing number of energy assets, the increasingly decentralized and segmented energy sector fuels the potential for new digital use cases. In this paper, we focus our attention on the application field of asset logging, which addresses the collection, documentation, and usage of relevant asset data for direct or later verification. We identified a number of promising use cases that so far have not been implemented; supposedly due to the lack of a suitable technical infrastructure. Besides the high degree of complexity associated with various stakeholders and the diversity of assets involved, the main challenge we found in asset logging use cases is to guarantee the tamper-resistance and integrity of the stored data while meeting scalability, addressing cost requirements, and protecting sensitive data. Against this backdrop, we present a blockchain-based platform and argue that it can meet all identified requirements. Our proposed technical solution hierarchically aggregates data in Merkle trees and leverages Merkle proofs for the efficient and privacy-preserving verification of data integrity, thereby ensuring scalability even for highly frequent data logging. By connecting all stakeholders and assets involved on the platform through bilateral and authenticated communication channels and adding a blockchain as a shared foundation of trust, we implement a wide range of asset logging use cases and provide the basis for leveraging platform effects in future use cases that build on verifiable data. Along with the technical aspects of our solution, we discuss the challenges of its practical implementation in the energy sector and the next steps for testing in a regulatory sandbox approach.

Fairness, Integrity, and Privacy in a Scalable Blockchain-based Federated Learning System

“…Moreover, we expect many use cases for our proposed system to be built on sensor data (e.g., from vehicular networks or health applications). Given this, and the availability of certified sensors (e.g., by means of a crypto-chip on the sensor and a certificate of the manufacturer), as are emerging, for example, in Germany's Smart Meter rollout [81], the ZKP-based approach could handle this issue by including a proof of authenticity (i.e., a proof that the data was signed by a private key that is bound to a certificate that was in turn signed by a trusted, publicly known entity) for the sensor input data when committing to it. This would be easy to integrate at the costs of an additional signature verification per Merkle tree leaf (around 5,000 constraints per leaf for a Schnorr signature).…”

Trusting the trust machine: Evaluating trust signals of blockchain applications

“…Further design parameters represent access restriction (private versus public) and read/write permissions (permissioned versus permissionless) (Fridgen et al, 2018). Researchers and practitioners have identified use cases in a variety of industries, including financial services (Ali et al, 2020;Garg et al, 2021), supply chain and logistics (Dubey et al, 2020;Guggenberger et al, 2020;Pournader et al, 2020;Wamba & Queiroz, 2020), manufacturing (Hughes et al, 2020), and the energy (Djamali et al, 2021)as well as the public sector (Amend et al, 2021;Rieger et al, 2019).…”

BBTCD: blockchain based traceability of counterfeited drugs

“…Nizamuddin et al ( 2019 ) gives a sale and digital publication of assets using blockchain technology. Djamali ( 2021 ) offers a methodological solution for providing high frequency of data and efficiency that uses a Merkle tree and influences Merkle 12 proofs for confirmation of data integrity, privacy and security (Djamali 2021 ). Di Francesco Maesa et al ( 2017 ) introduced a blockchain based protocol and policy that is widely evident in exchanging rights, therefore any handler can easily use resources and know about policy at all time that is paired with resources.…”