Distributed Ledger Smart Sensor Utility Architecture
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current utility network infrastructure systems face challenges in configuring smart sensors for specific billing rates and meter configuration data, predicting resource consumption, and ensuring secure sharing of consumption and billing data, leading to inefficiencies and financial strains on utility suppliers.
Innovation Solution
A distributed ledger system is implemented in a tiered utility architecture, enabling smart contracts for near-real-time payments, dynamic rate applications, demand response events, and location awareness, while ensuring enhanced security through encryption schemes that obscure digital addresses.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If a centralized utility communication network is used, then network management and control are simplified, but network latency increases and robustness against node failure decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the centralized utility network into a decentralized network where individual nodes (smart meters, routers, relays, transformers) perform distributed computing functions. This segmentation allows the network to maintain management capabilities while improving robustness through distribution across multiple independent nodes that can continue operating if individual nodes fail.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces a new dimension of network architecture by implementing a distributed ledger technology layer that operates across the decentralized network. This additional layer enables nodes to verify and record transactions independently, providing both management oversight and enhanced reliability through cryptographic verification and redundancy.
2Reliability
If individual nodes perform distributed computing functions, then network latency is reduced and robustness improves, but security concerns and computing power requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces cryptographic intermediaries (digital signatures, hash functions, and consensus mechanisms) that mediate between individual nodes performing distributed computing and the overall network security requirements. These intermediaries enable nodes to independently verify transactions and maintain security without requiring centralized trust, thus improving robustness while managing security concerns through mathematical verification rather than physical security measures.
3Productivity
If smart meters report consumption automatically, then manual reading effort is eliminated, but data security and privacy protection requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces manual data collection and verification mechanisms with automated cryptographic verification systems. Smart meters automatically report consumption data, and the distributed ledger automatically verifies and records these reports using cryptographic signatures, eliminating the need for manual meter reading while securing data through mathematical proofs rather than physical security controls.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent creates cryptographic copies (hashes) of consumption data that are stored on the distributed ledger. These copies serve as immutable records that verify the authenticity and integrity of the original consumption reports without exposing the actual consumption details, thus enabling automatic reporting while protecting data security and privacy through cryptographic representation.
4Reliability
If distributed ledger technology is implemented, then data security and transaction transparency are improved, but system complexity and implementation difficulty increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a universal distributed ledger platform that serves multiple functions simultaneously: secure transaction recording, automated contract execution, data verification, and network coordination. By creating a multi-functional system, the patent reduces the need for separate specialized systems, thereby managing complexity through consolidation while achieving enhanced security and transparency through the ledger's inherent cryptographic properties.
Data Source
AI summary
A distributed ledger based utility system architecture may be configured to enable secure payments, data transmission, and meter configuration of smart sensors. The utility system architecture may be a tiered architecture including multiple nodes at different levels of the architecture where each level may contain a different portion of the distributed ledger. As information is added to the distributed ledger, each portion of the distributed ledger may be updated based on whether the information is relevant to that node. The information may include rate contract transactions, meter configuration data transactions, payment transactions, or the like.