WePower’s Path to Green Decentralized Energy
The nature in which technology is advancing is pushing us into uncharted territory faster than ever before. Companies around the world are adopting blockchain technology to increase global access and inclusivity in almost all areas of life. Historically, the energy sector has been one of the last industry titans to adopt change — until now.
At WePower, our primary goal is to help energy evolve from its 19th century way of doing business and place it at the forefront of progress and innovation. We aim to do this by building a global market from the ground-up that gives everyone equal access to green energy, without having to pay unnecessary fees associated with big bank institutions by switching to a peer-to-peer energy trading platform. However, due to the fact that big energy has been hesitant to embrace change until recently, we are working with old infrastructure that was built with dirty energy in mind. In other words, there are limitations and there will be growing pains that will accompany the move to a system that prioritizes renewable energy.
Moving Towards a Cleaner Tomorrow
As it currently stands, electricity grids are not optimized to take full advantage of distributed green energy resources with generation profiles varying as the wind blows and the sun shines. Instead, they are engineered for central dirty energy plants with stable generation profiles based on keeping a constant flow of steam running turbines. The problem that comes from this, is that as we add more distributed green energy to our grids, that were not designed for it, we need to account for the voltage fluctuations and potential overload problems and grid reinforcement investment is needed. For stability, the current grid reinforcements are planned for peak generation and consumption, not for the dynamic green energy future where solar, wind, batteries and electric cars roam around consuming and producing in a chaotic symphony. So, in a nutshell, we are overpaying for our grid fees to integrate renewables into the old static grid paradigm and we can and must do better.
Before society is able to move towards a green-first sustainable solution to power our economies, we first need to upgrade all old electrical infrastructure systems so that they are truly optimized for electric vehicles and distributed renewable energy consumption and production. This is happening too slowly and is still too dependent on political will and subsidies. It needs to accelerate significantly, so there needs to be more investment in green solutions, which is our primary challenge with regards to decarbonization of our economies. In spite of more countries pledging to go green in the near future, 2016 remained an uneventful year for the renewable energy. Investments in green energy saw nearly a 25% drop from the previous year, and due to the outed and exclusive nature of the energy sector, in most countries, only big industries invest in energy.
Overcoming the structural limitations
Thanks to the increased adoption of blockchain technology, we have been able to use WePower as a means to open green investing to the general public. As someone who has worked for over a decade regarding strategic planning of energy and technology, I have seen firsthand how increased democratization paves the way for technological progress. For WePower specifically, this is achieved through secure smart contracts that protect the interests of the consumer, investor, and the producer, so that every transaction is agreed to beforehand and its terms upheld. The smart contract marketplace is then integrated with machine learning assisted advanced analytics and control systems — so that the WePower platform can understand and control, where needed, the physical processes of energy generation and distribution.
I have seen firsthand how increased democratization paves the way for technological progress.
With more investment and more activity on the WePower platform, we will be able to help overcome the structural limitations of outdated energy and help pioneer a world run by globally accessible renewable energy. Our project is supported by the Republic of Lithuania’s Ministry of Energy and has been praised for its ability to use cryptocurrency to promote clean energy for all, and our first large-scale solar energy plant will be operational within nine months of our ICO.
As we grow, I look forward to helping reduce CO2 pollution and assist with building a platform that promotes transparency and decentralized access for everyone seeking cleaner energy.
