2023.11.15
French-Japanese workshop on
blockchain technologies andapplications to digital trust Day2

Considerations about
Data & Device Trust forEnergy Resources
Yoshikazu Azuma

What I talk• introduction – myself & company / business• necessity of energy resources IoT, that means
ERA(Energy Resources Aggregation) for
renewable energy• VPP(Virtual Power Plant) services with ERA ofDER(Distributed Energy Resources)• Trust in the electric power system© NR-Power Lab2

Introduction

Introduction of myself and thecompany© NR-Power Lab

01｜Self-introduction of Speaker

Yoshikazu AZUMANR-Power Lab’s CTO, Seconded from Ricoh Company Co., Ltd.
• Main Areas of Expertise
Wi-Fi (wireless LAN), Ethernet, SDN(Software-Defined Networking), etc.
Network and interface technologies, Security related to them,Standardization activities related to them, etc.
- Examples of Development Achievements:
High-speed Wireless LAN Technology | Global | Ricoh• Recent Work
Data trust & Device trust for Energy Resources“Traceability of renewable energy with blockchain” PoC in Electric Power field.
Applying Blockchain Technology to Renewable Energy | Global | Ricoh
Working Group launch work in Green*Digital Consortium
Green x Digital コンソーシアム (gxdc.jp) (Sponsored by JEITA )• Award- TCG Key Contributor Award 2020 Contribution-Award | Of | Trusted Computing Group | (TCG)- Interop Tokyo 2022 Best of Show Award “Special Prize” External LAN Ports expansion option box Type M37© NR-Power Lab

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02｜Company profile
Company name

NR-Power Lab Co., Ltd.

Location＜Head Office＞
NALIC #312&#313, 2-22-8 Chikusa, Chikusa-ku, Nagoya, Aichi＜Shin-Yokohama Office＞
I's building #402, 3-18-5 Shin-Yokohama, Kohoku-ku, Yokohama, Kanagawa

Businesscommencement
dateFebruary 1, 2023

Capital40 million yen/ Investment ratio/ NGK Insulators 51%, Ricoh 49%

Business details

Business development related to VPP(Virtual Power Plant)
and Energy resources data services

Number ofemployees

14(Current)© NR-Power Lab5

03｜Why NGK Insulators & Ricoh ? / Business Development Targets

NAS® Energy Storage& Operational Technologies for its

IoT/network technologies through thedevelopment of office equipment, etc.

EnergyResources
Data Services

VPP(: VirtualPower Plant)
Services
By the IoTof energy
resources.

Providing services forcarbon neutral based onenergy resource data.

It is the IoT for energy
resources. Energy storageis important part.

Aim to contribute to renewable energy spread and sustainable society.
© NR-Power Lab

6BackgroundWhy is IoT of energy resources
necessary for the spread ofrenewable energy?
© NR-Power Lab

07｜What happens due to the spread of renewable energy◼ The power grid becomes unstable.
Generation
Transmission& Distribution

RetailConsumers

Large WindPower
Generation

Large PV
Generation• Both the supply on thegenerating side and thereverse power flow on the
consumer side affect thegrid.

Transmission& Distribution

RetailRooftop PV
EV Carport
Energy Storage
Figure from METI（ https://www.enecho.meti.go.jp/about/special/johoteikyo/dr.html ）‐ Red part is added by NR-Power Lab.

Consumers© NR-Power Lab

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08｜Electric Power grid needs "balancing".

SupplyConsumeSupply

Consume• The power grid is
the OT system forcontrol "balancing“balancing

imbalance
Power outage risk

 And currently, the amount of power generation is adjusted mainly by thermal power plants© NR-Power Lab

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09｜ Because of change in power supply ratio, DER, ERA is required Instead of declining thermal power plants, other resources willbe needed to adjust electric power.

Renewable
Renewable
Thermalpower

Increasing renewable energy(RE)sources for Carbon Neutral
The instability of RE

Thermalpower

Decrease thermal power rate

To spread renewable energy more,
power grid needs flexibility
Reference METI’s reporthttps://www.meti.go.jp/press/2022/11/20221122001/20221115002-a.pdf

How to balance the supply
and demand instead of large“adjustable” power plants?
Small-scale energy
resources on the consumers
side are expected for this.
It is called DER (DistributedEnergy Resources)“IoT of DER” is called
ERA(Energy ResourcesAggregation).

...and the services
enabled by ERA is VPP(Virtual Power Plant).
© NR-Power Lab10

Services through the ERA: Energy Resource Aggregation

VPP(Virtual Power Plant)& Secondary effects of it© NR-Power Lab

10｜What is VPP services? What is “Electric Power Reserve”?

VPP are services that aggregate DER facilities to perform functions"like" electric power plants
Generation

Focus on facilities
distributed over awide area in
consumer side(= DER)
Aggregation of
DER by IoT = ERATransmission& Distribution

The thing "like" electric power
created by VPP is called"Electric Power Reserve".

RetailConsumers

Especially, energy storage iskey facility for VPP.

Examples of facilities :Energy storage, Air Conditioning & Lighting, PV/EV, Generator, Electric
Water Heater, Co-generator, Hydrogen generator, Industrial Equipment, etc.

Examples of VPP operation :• Insufficient power generation: Discharging from energy storage,
Reducing power consumption for air conditioning & lighting, etc.
•Surplus power generation: Charging to energy storage, etc.

Figure from METI（ https://www.enecho.meti.go.jp/about/special/johoteikyo/dr.html ）‐ Red part is added by NR-Power Lab.

© NR-Power Lab

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11｜ERA can measure “Green” attributes.

• Facilities data can be obtained in ERA.
• That is, Green attributes.
• They create additional services.
Control/monitoring of multiple resources : efficient power use

Provision of secondary
services:
Solutions related
Carbon Neutral by ERA
such as...

RE Generator & Energy Storage

Attributes for RE

Air Conditioning & Lighting
Attributes for
Reducing energy

Generator & Industrial Equipment
Attributes forEnergy levelingcarbon footprint(CFP)
calculation, renewableenergy credit issuance,etc.

VPP/ERA Users can increase ROI in the investment tofacilities,
due to the economic value generated by the Green attributes
and the reducing electricity power charges through theefficient electricity power use.
© NR-Power Lab

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Challenges in connecting a large number of energy resources

Trust in the Electric Power System© NR-Power Lab

12｜ Difficult points for IoT of energy resources, ERA
ERA requires OT/IT convergence

Large amount & Distributed over a wide area
GenerationTransmission& Distribution

RetailConsumersEnergy resources are part of the "power grid," an OT systemthat controls physical phenomena such as power generation,charging, and discharging. Trust data is required.

How does the ERA system verify the identity of manyenergy resources that are far away?

Of course, network quality is important. In addition, trusted data exchange andtrusted identity with bi-directional verification is important.
© NR-Power Lab15

13｜Challenges #1: “Data trust” for Green attributes
This is a concept of "infrastructure" in the electric power industry shareverifiable Green attributes.
Of course, the system does not necessarily have to use blockchain. However,there are many stakeholders in this use case, so it may work reasonably.

Awareness throughthis PoC:

This industry has
been put “theInternetconnection” on theback burner...
How to create aframework for"trust" in theindustry field?

Figure from Ricoh（ https://www.ricoh.com/technology/tech/089_blockchain ）© NR-Power Lab

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14｜Legacy electric power system “Trust”
System architecture by networking with leased lines
Generation
Transmission& Distribution

RetailConsumers

If the energy resources are few, the system works well. Of course, there is noproblem with "trust" due to a closed network.
But this method does not have reasonable scalability. need to use the Internetfor many DERs.
© NR-Power Lab

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15｜ To DER, how about applying the current web trust?
Trust by X.509 certificate
Generation
Transmission& Distribution

RetailConsumers

Concernes:
Dependency on Certificate Authorities
Web certificates can only validate string matches (e.g., Comon Name, etc.)
Generating and installing certificates on IoT devices is not so scalable.
© NR-Power Lab18

16｜How about applying the next generation trust to DER?
Trust by DID(Decentralized Identifiers) and its related standards, VC(Verifiable Credentials) etc.

Distributed ledgers(Public,Consortium )VCs Issuer

Each Wallets ( Hot, Cold )Blockchain or NOT

DID

VC

DID

VC

DID

VC

DID

Various combinations ofimplementations arepossible.

Some of the problems with X.509 may be solved. But there are no silver bullets…
Things to think about:
Who is issuer for VCs? How about his trust & VC’s contents? Eventually, rules andstandards for data models and trust, etc. are needed in each industry.
© NR-Power Lab

1915｜Challenges #2: “Device trust” for DER

For expanding the use of DER, the issue of "trust" is unavoidable.
For a while, maybe the legacy and the next generation method will coexist.
By proposing means to achieve trust,
NR-Power Lab would like tocontribute to the expansion of ERAand VPP services in the industry.
The proposal and implementation ofthe concept can change the current
situation little by little...
NEWS:
The Association for ERA in Japan wasestablished in October.
https://www.denkishimbun.com/archives/321499 (in Japanese)© NR-Power Lab20Summary• For the spread of renewable energy, ERA isrequired to aggregate many DERs with IoT• VPP services are provided by ERA. In addition,
ERA can use IoT data to provide other services,such as measuring Green attributes, etc.
• Because the power systems handle missioncritical data, ERA aggregating many DERs needs
to continuously improve the trust of data anddevices.
© NR-Power Lab21

https://nr-power-lab.jp© NR-Power Lab