What is the future prospect of energy blockchain? What are its advantages in energy Internet applications?

Application of blockchain in the energy sector

The core function of blockchain technology is to ensure the authenticity of data without relying on a central or third-party organization, break down trust barriers, greatly reduce the trust cost required for business development, and promote efficient business development. At present, the application of blockchain in the energy field has begun to take shape, and some developed countries in Europe and the United States and a few high-tech companies have begun to try to apply blockchain technology to the energy field.

For example, in terms of energy education, the application of blockchain in the field of energy trading can revolve around the establishment of a distributed trading and supply system. The specific application prospects are shown in the figure below.

The combination of blockchain and energy internet

Blockchain technology has a strong internal consistency with the concept of energy internet, and smart contracts can realize unmanned smart energy internet. In essence, both energy internet and blockchain technology must be built on the universal smart device internet of things. The universal intelligence and interconnection of devices will be mutually reinforcing with the development of energy internet.

Blockchain technology also emphasizes the Internet of Things and intelligence of value network participants. The role of smart contracts based on blockchain is not just as its name suggests, which can only realize the exchange of physical or digital assets. In fact, the real role of smart contracts lies in the immutability and collective consensus characteristics of blockchain. The pre-written code can directly call the data on the blockchain with little or no human intervention, execute all computable logical functions, and output and execute the results.

Therefore, the real meaning of smart contracts is to provide intelligent rules for the interaction between various entities on the blockchain, and to realize various complex logical functions without human participation. This feature is called Turing completeness. From this perspective, if the smart device network of the energy Internet is to achieve complete unmanned intelligence, it is probably impossible to do without the help of blockchain technology, especially the smart contract technology deployed on the blockchain.

In short, in the application of energy Internet, blockchain has the following technical advantages:

At present, the core purpose of blockchain in the construction of my country's energy internet is to build a transparent, widely participated and fully trusted financial transaction system between the pan-energy physical network and the pan-energy information application network. Through such a transaction system, a system-level solution is provided for green subsidies, green operations and green finance, so that a seamless data link can be achieved between industry and finance, and a three-dimensional integration between the physical model of energy, the information model of the Internet and the financial system of blockchain can be achieved.

It can be foreseen that the application path of blockchain in the energy Internet in the future will change from the separate application of a single technology to the final comprehensive application, providing an important way to resolve transaction frictions in the energy system.

The future of energy blockchain

Energy blockchain projects are mainly concentrated in Europe and the United States. The United States still has the best soil for energy blockchain entrepreneurship. Silicon Valley in California and New York in the United States are home to a large number of energy blockchain entrepreneurs. In addition to the United States, Europe, especially Germany, also has many energy blockchain projects. Germany has a relatively supportive attitude towards blockchain technology as a whole. Coupled with Germany's relatively developed distributed renewable energy, the application of blockchain in the energy field is very promising.

Compared with the activeness of blockchain energy investment and application in foreign countries, my country's energy blockchain field is still basically a blue ocean, but many explorers have begun to appear in this blue ocean in the past two years. Energy Internet is an important strategy for my country's energy development, and the application of blockchain in the energy field has gradually been put on the agenda.

Overall, the implementation of energy internet in China is not limited by backward technology. In fact, the information level and industrial technology strength of China's energy system are close to or even exceed those of some developed countries. With the reform of the power market and energy supply side as the background, blockchain technology has the characteristics of decentralization, openness, transparency, security and reliability, which provides an important technical means to solve the transaction friction in the energy system and will have a wide and far-reaching impact on all areas of my country's energy.