Blockchain for Internet of Energy management: Review, solutions, and challenges

After smart grid, Internet of Energy (IoE) has emerged as a popular technology in the energy sector by integrating different forms of energy. IoE uses Internet to collect, organize, optimize and manage the networks energy information from different edge devices in order to develop a distributed smart energy infrastructure. Sensors and communication technologies are used to collect data and to predict demand and supply by consumers and suppliers respectively. However, with the development of renewable energy resources, Electric Vehicles (EVs), smart grid and Vehicle-to-grid (V2G) technology, the existing energy sector started shifting towards distributed and decentralized solutions. Moreover, the security and privacy issues because of centralization is another major concern for IoE technology. In this context, Blockchain technology with the features of automation, immutability, public ledger facility, irreversibility, decentralization, consensus and security has been adopted in the literature for solving the prevailing problems of centralized IoE architecture. By leveraging smart contracts, blockchain technology enables automated data exchange, complex energy transactions, demand response management and Peer-to-Peer (P2P) energy trading etc. Blockchain will play vital role in the evolution of the IoE market as distributed renewable resources and smart grid network are being deployed and used. We discuss the potential and applications of blockchain in the IoE field. This article is build on the literature research and it provides insight to the end-user regarding the future IoE scenario in the context of blockchain technology. Lastly this article discusses the different consensus algorithm for IoE technology.