In 2017 the Australian Government awarded a grant to an $8 million project in the city of Fremantle, which will use the Power Ledger platform. Here’s an update of what’s happened since then.

In November last year, the Australian government announced they will provide $2.57 million in funding for a cutting edge project in the City of Fremantle. $5.68 million will be funded through project partners including Curtin University, Murdoch University, Curtin Institute of Computation, LandCorp, CSIRO/Data61, CISCO and Power Ledger.

The project will trial the use of blockchain-powered distributed energy and water systems and was the second largest recipient of the Grant across all of Australia, following the ‘Switching on Darwin’ project.

Project Update

On February 1st, the project Consortium met for the first time at the Power Ledger office. There were 26 members of the Consortium and potential contractors in attendance. The meeting was useful to identify what each project partner would be responsible for and who they would be working with directly. We also went through the Project Charter and had valuable discussions.

The following week, Curtin University signed the Grant Agreement with the Government meaning the scope and deliverables were agreed upon and we can now start the project!

How is Power Ledger Involved?

Power Ledger will provide the transactional layer for the renewable assets, the energy and water systems, as well as the ownership model for the community owned battery.

We’ll develop and maintain all the blockchain applications on the project, which will demonstrate how blockchain technology works with co-located assets as well as assets at other locations, such as an off-site solar farm which is planned for South Fremantle.

The data will also interface with water assets. If there’s excess on-site energy generation, it can be used at the water treatment systems then and there rather than waiting until the evening, when the energy is more expensive. The assets will be in a water-energy synergy so they’re benefiting each other — just like their own ecosystem.

What’s Next?

The next Consortium Meeting is in early March, where we will finalise anything that needs to be built into the greenfield site and explore potential locations already built.

Power Ledger’s first step is to procure the battery and work with various stakeholders to find the best location for it within the City of Fremantle. This will depend on if the battery can offer any services to the network operator, Western Power, or if it is more economical to place it on the Knutsford precinct or beside the South Fremantle solar farm.

Project Timeline

The project is just getting started and will conclude on June 30, 2019.