Design and implementation of a blockchain-based architecture for peer-to-peer electricity markets

Looking at the development of electric energy systems, renewable energy sources have been given the freedom to inject in the electric energy grid the quantity of energy they wanted, so called dispatch priority. This approach was possible because the relatively limited number of such facilities, but considering the ambitious targets of renewable energy share all the World major economies are aiming to increase the percentage of renewable electricity, and that these also help decarbonize the heating and mobility sectors, such approach will be no longer sustainable. Many are the ways currently explored to balance electric demand and generation ranging from electric energy storage technologies to demand-response markets. The peer-to-peer local markets couple local consumers and producers of electric energy minimizing the need of intervention from System Operator, both at Distribution (DSO) and above it at Transmission (TSO) level. The goal of this Master thesis is to tackle the above mentioned challenge developing a decentralized and distributed application with the aim of realizing the logic of a local peer-to-peer market, where multiple producers and multiple consumers match bid and demand. The implementation of this system is based on the use of a private Ethereum-based Blockchain that uses Proof of Authority as a consensus protocol. The auction logic is regulated by a smart contract. The choice of the Blockchain is due precisely to its characteristics: immutability, decentralization, consensus driven and transparency. Furthermore, a web front-end has been developed that allows the user to see the results of the interaction with the Blockchain. To give greater value to this study, a working prototype of a smart meter coupled to a Raspberry Pi was created which interacts with the Blockchain and turns on or off loads on the basis of the winnings or not. A study was carried out on the implementation costs of the local market in terms of both storage occupied by the smart contract and the cost of the various transactions. To assess the general validity of this work, a scalability study was also carried out to assess the operating limits and times of this application subject to the constraints of a local market whose periods of commercial exchanges are expiring in a quarter of an hour