By Jennifer Hansen

Blockchain clean energy project Swytch and the Germany-based aggregated energy trading company Energy2market GmbH (e2m) this week announced a pilot program that includes about 3.5Gw of solar, wind, hydro and biogas energy capacity in Germany, which is enough to power over 500,000 homes.

As part of the large-scale pilot, Swytch is testing its first versions of the data flow, blockchain, dashboard, estimators, token allocation models and other key parts of the platform.

Swytch is also entering its token sale. To sign up, visit Swytch.

Swytch is a blockchain-based platform that tracks and verifies the impact of sustainability efforts and actions on the worldwide level of C02 emissions.

For more information on the pilot, we created a short video here.

Swytch leverages smart meter and blockchain technology to reward the companies and people who reduce carbon emissions the most. At the core of the Swytch solution is an open-source “Oracle” that uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to determine how much carbon is being displaced and therefor how many Swytch tokens to award. As a result, producers of renewable energy create Swytch tokens by generating solar, wind, and other forms of renewable energy. e2m perceives Swytch’s approach to tokenized incentives in the energy market as particularly attractive to the larger energy producers and traders it serves.

“We firmly believe that blockchain technology can be used to unlock long-term value for Europe’s renewable energy assets,” said Andreas Keil, CEO of Energy2market. “Today, renewable energy represents 32 percent of the total energy market in Germany, but we have a goal of reaching 70 percent by 2050. Government-based incentive programs can only do so much, and a more dynamic option is needed. Additionally, some countries, like Germany, will begin phasing out their incentive programs in the next few years. We need to prepare for the future and identify new subsidy instruments and trading mechanism.”

This partnership will allow e2m to gain insight into alternatives to existing incentive programs and leverage blockchain, which has security and immutability, making it an ideal technology to help reshape an industry that relies on timely and accurate data. Additionally, e2m believes that Swytch, as a global incentive program and data source, has the ability to empower governments, cities, corporations and individuals to take a more active role in accelerating the adoption of renewable supply and sustainability programs. A partnership with Swytch will create a competitive advantage as buyers and sellers of energy gain access to higher quality data in addition to an incentive that will be effective across geographic barriers.

“Just as blockchain is applicable to supply chain management and verification of physical assets, it is also beneficial for recording and tracking environmental attributions,” said Evan Caron, co-founder and managing director of Swytch. “When compared to existing programs this will drastically reduce fraud and administrative costs as well as open up incentive mechanisms to residential properties, which are the key to accelerated adoption of renewables. This positions Swytch as a central player in the global grassroots movement to reduce carbon emissions.”

Renewable energy technology will continue to gain market share and assets will become more dispersed. The middlemen between energy consumption and production will be eliminated. Power markets will become decentralized.

But how do we get there? To create these changes, we need improvements in:

• automated production and consumption tracking
• validation
• payments
• transparency
• incentives
• security

These improvements will require a distributed, self-organizing system that reduces friction, routes around regulatory obstacles and connects fractured markets.

Enter blockchain. The distributed nature of blockchain provides an unprecedented level of trust and transparency. This enables businesses to feel confident in transactions that require a high degree of trust. Breeching the security of a central database is one thing – trying to fool a decentralized, global network of databases is almost impossible. The result is a reduced need for middlemen, faster transactions and lower expenses than traditional centralized models.

As an independent trading company operating throughout Europe, e2m specializes in managing and optimizing dynamic portfolios and marketing the flexibility derived from decentralized generation and consumption systems. With a marketed generation capacity of renewable energy of more than 3,500 MW in Germany, e2m is in that region one of the biggest providers of market access services. It has the infrastructure required for marketing flexibility as well as access to all German and to international trading markets. As an international group, e2m has subsidiaries in UK, Poland, Austria, Italy and Scandinavia.