Today, Australian blockchain firm Power Ledger announced a partnership with Indian electricity distributor BSES Rajdhani Power Ltd (BRPL) to substantially expand the trial of its peer-to-peer (P2P) energy trading platform in Delhi.
Initially, the trial was run for 5-6MW of existing solar infrastructure servicing a group of housing societies in the Dwarka region. During the trial, residents with rooftop solar were able to sell excess solar energy to their neighbours and monetize their investment in setting up solar panels. Meanwhile, BRPL was also able to access this electricity during peak demand periods.
The trial will soon be expanded to include blockchain-enabled solutions for group net metering, virtual net metering, electric vehicle charging and virtual power plant applications.
“With the exponential growth in our economy and production, the ability to generate clean energy and utilize it across India without the need for a fully centralized grid is critical,” said Amal Sinha, CEO of BRPL.”Realizing the importance of distributed generation, we have already built an extensive renewables infrastructure, and this trial with Power Ledger will help us fully utilize that energy.”
Back in June, Delhi’s electricity demand touched an all-time high of 7,241 MW, the highest peak power demand recorded in any Indian city. BRPL is one of the leading suppliers of electricity in the region. The company is a joint venture between Anil Ambani owned Reliance Infrastructure and the Delhi government.
Meanwhile, the Indian government’s Ministry of New and Renewable Energy has set a target of installing 175 GW of renewable energy capacity by 2022 in the country. The government has also established a goal of installing 40 GW of grid-connected rooftop solar capacity in the country, including Delhi and National Capital Region (NCR) by 2022.
This is the second trial of Power Ledger’s P2P energy trading platform in India. Previously, the company had partnered with Tech Mahindra for a proof of concept across the latter’s technology campuses in the country.
Recently, Power Ledger signed its first commercial deal with Australian electricity wholesaler Powerclub. The partnership with BRPL gives the blockchain firm a larger playing field with a trial in India’s capital.
“Although we’ve already initiated several successful P2P energy trading projects across the globe, this partnership with BRPL provides an opportunity to really scale to an enterprise-style application and provide a guide for policy development in Delhi,” said Vinod Tiwari, head of business development and sales at Power Ledger.
Power Ledger is currently running trials in several countries including Thailand, Japan, Malaysia, Austria and the United States.
