Blockchain for smart cities: A review of architectures, integration trends and future research directions

Blockchain technology in the future smart grids: A comprehensive review and frameworks

With ever increasing people's awareness of low carbon and environmental protection, electric vehicles are gradually gaining wide popularity. However, the driving endurance of the electric vehicle is the biggest shortage that hinders the fully acceptance of this new vehicle technology. To deal with this shortage, this paper proposed a vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) electricity trading scheme based on Bayesian game pricing in blockchain-enabled Internet of vehicles (BIoV). Specifically, the Bayesian game is adopted for pricing in the distributed BIoV with incomplete information sharing. The optimal pricing under the linear strategic equilibrium has been obtained which maximizes the utilities of both sides of electricity transaction. The transaction volume is determined from the formulated convex problem that maximizes the social welfare. Then, the pricing game is implemented by the dedicated smart contract. Blockchain guarantees its trustworthiness, security, and reliability. Finally, the experimental results show that referring to the benchmark of static game with complete information, the proposed Bayesian game with incomplete information can achieve approximate satisfaction of users. The degree of approximation can reach to 98% when the pricing ranges of buyers and sellers are close. Moreover, the proposed scheme has great advantages over the static game with complete information in terms of communication overhead and timeliness in the decentralized IoVs.

A Bayesian Game Based Vehicle-to-Vehicle Electricity Trading Scheme for Blockchain-Enabled Internet of Vehicles

With rapid development of enabling technologies such as Internet of Things, robotics, and big data, the fourth industrial revolution known as “Industry 4.0” (I4.0) has become a great opportunity for productivity innovation around the world. Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), as a typical implication of Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) in I4.0 era, has attracted significant attention. It aims at optimizing resources and improving production efficiency for manufacturing industry through deep interconnection of physical equipment, wide collection of multi-dimensional data, intelligent awareness of environment and automatic control. Blockchain is a kind of distributed ledger technology and has features including decentralization, anti-tamper, transparency, anonymity, and contract-autonomy. These features are helpful to improve the services and promote the development of IIoT. In this paper, we provide a comprehensive survey on the literatures applying blockchain technology into IIoT. We firstly introduce the related works and background knowledge. And then, the motivations and benefits for applying blockchain into IIoT are discussed in detail. Furthermore, based on the layered architecture of blockchain we summarized in the previous work, we outline the research framework of blockchain in IIoT. Meanwhile, the related application research is presented from the perspectives of devices security, data collection and sharing, and industrial application. Moreover, we explore the technical requirements of blockchain platforms in IIoT applications. Finally, some challenges and future directions on blockchain in IIoT, as well as broader perspectives, are concluded for further study.

A Comprehensive Survey on Blockchain in Industrial Internet of Things: Motivations, Research Progresses, and Future Challenges

Given the ongoing transition towards a more decentralised and adaptive energy system, the potential of blockchain-enabled smart contracts for the energy sector is being increasingly recognised. Due to their self-executing, customisable and tamper-proof nature, they are seen as a key technology for enabling the transition to a more efficient, transparent and transactive energy market. The applications of smart contracts include coordination of smart electric vehicle charging, automated demand-side response, peer-to-peer energy trading and allocation of the control duties amongst the network operators. Nevertheless, their use in the energy sector is still in its early stages as there are many open challenges related to security, privacy, scalability and billing. In this paper, we systematically review 178 peer-reviewed publications and 13 innovation projects, providing a thorough analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of smart contracts used in the energy sector. This work offers a broad perspective on the opportunities and challenges that stakeholders using this technology face, in both current and emergent markets, such as peer-to-peer energy trading platforms. To provide a roadmap for researchers and practitioners interested in the technology, we propose a systematic model of the smart contracting process, by developing a novel 6-layer architecture, as well as presenting a sample energy contract in pseudocode form and as open-source code. Our analysis focuses on the two mainstream application areas we identify for smart contract use in this area: energy and flexibility trading, and distributed control. The paper concludes with a comprehensive, critical discussion of the advantages and challenges that must be addressed in the area of smart contracts and blockchains in energy, and a set of recommendations that researchers and developers should consider when applying smart contracts to energy system settings. 

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2021.112013

Smart contracts in energy systems: A systematic review of fundamental approaches and implementations

To mitigate the problems of demand-supply mismatch in the future grid the solution of renewable energy source (RES) integration results in a bidirectional flow of information and transactions, which are prone to different kinds of cyber attacks, especially in energy trading where the security of financial transactions is of most concern. Electric vehicle (EV) having the advantage of mobility can play a significant role in maintaining demand-supply balance at any location unlike their peers (conventional compensator). For deciding entire system security, securing EVs charging-discharging transactions at all charging stations or connecting points is most important. The system can be made more secure against cyber-attacks with the introduction of the blockchain framework. Hence, in view of secured transactions, the paper focuses on the energy trading process between EVs and distribution network (DN) in a Byzantine based blockchain consensus framework. During peak load period DN initiates the energy trading process by demanding additional power from the EVs. This process of energy trading results in energy and information exchange which needs to be secured through blockchain from vulnerable attacks and threats. Possible scenarios of various cyber-attacks on different nodes of the system are visualized in the form of false data. To highlight the application of blockchain, the Byzantine general problem framework is used which states that for successful attack 33% of information is to be manipulated, in other words, decreasing the probability of attack confirms the system security. Numerical results based on various operating scenarios for the standard IEEE 33 bus system are in agreement with the Byzantine consensus problem indicating improvement in system security.

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Secured Energy Trading Using Byzantine-Based Blockchain Consensus

Research related to electric vehicles (EV) is mainly focused on the hardware such as battery charging method, and still there is a lack of software research such as billing system that needs to be developed realistically. The result of charge measured in the charging EV can be different from the charged amount claimed to be charged in the charging system (CS). However, due to the potential security and privacy issues caused by untrusted and opaque energy markets, it becomes a great challenge to optimally schedule the charging behaviors of EVs with distinct energy delivery preferences of the CSs. In this paper, a novel EV participation charging scheme is proposed for a decentralized blockchain using smart contracts. Firstly, a permissioned blockchain system is introduced to implement secure charging services for EVs with the execution of smart contracts. Furthermore, based on the smart contract designed each EVs individual needs from CS is satisfied while maximizing its utility.

Energy Trading of Electric Vehicles using Blockchain and Smart Contracts

In today’s modern life the smart buildings play an important role in providing a luxurious environment with reduced energy consumption and environmental concern. For managing every smart equipment according to the requirement and comfort, the centralized management system called the Building Management System (BMS) performs an essential part. The operations of BMS is majorly coordinated with the communication layer or a cyber layer. Thus, the BMS is very much prone to cyber attacks and can lead to malfunctioning of major components in BMS. Another important aspect is electrical faults in the system irrespective of any cyber attacks. The paper focuses, firstly, to identify the electrical fault and attack with proposed Boolean Identification Strategy (BIS). Secondly, after the identification of attack, the paper analyzes the type of attacks with pattern recognition using Machine Learning classifier. The results show the effectiveness of proposed strategies by recognizing the pattern of the two most familiar cyber attacks.

Cyber Attack and Fault Identification of HVAC System in Building Management Systems

In recent years, vehicular networks have been drawing special attention because of its significant potential role in the future smart city. Safety is a crucial status in vehicular networks, especially in energy trading where security of transactional data and safety against critical attacks is of most concern. The Sybil attack is one where an adversary can create multiple fake identities, become a part of the P2P network and try to manipulate the decision of the entire network in accordance to his own will. Thus in view to enhance the security of system, this paper focuses on a Sybil attack mitigation method based on blockchain and it's Proof of Work (PoW) consensus. Also a framework of automated privacy-preserving selection of charging stations (CS) based on pricing and the distance to the electric vehicle (EV) is presented. A blockchain based approach increases the transparency between EV and CS while preserving the privacy of the EV owners.

A Blockchain Construct for Energy Trading against Sybil Attacks

Advancements in smart control and the growing popularity of IoT devices have raised the demand of smart infrastructure. Smart buildings play a significant role in establishing a smart infrastructure. These buildings compose different subsystems that are connected through a complex cyber-physical network to a building management system (BMS). BMS monitors and controls components of a building with the help of various electronic components such as sensors, actuators, and measurement units. These devices are connected to the control center through communication networks. Due to the presence of a communication network, the system is always vulnerable to attacks in which an attacker can manipulate the sensors and measuring units and inject false data into the system. State estimation based techniques are used for fault detection, however, these techniques have limitations that encourage the demand for a more reliable system. The paper proposes a machine-learning algorithm to distinguish between normal state, fault state, and attack. The classification between fault and attack is achieved using the classifier learner tool in MATLAB. Support vector machine algorithm (SVM) is used to classify and through a comparative study, its superiority over other machine learning algorithms is shown. To validate the results various scenarios are considered to classify the different operating conditions.

V. Kamuni

Papers

Secured Energy Trading Using Byzantine-Based Blockchain Consensus

Energy Trading of Electric Vehicles using Blockchain and Smart Contracts

Cyber Attack and Fault Identification of HVAC System in Building Management Systems

A Blockchain Construct for Energy Trading against Sybil Attacks

A Machine Learning Approach to Distinguish Faults and Cyberattacks in Smart Buildings