$4.8 Million In Blockchain Funding To Be Offered By US Energy Department

Some terrific news for blockchain enthusiasts across the world. The U.S. Department of Energy has made a major announcement which establishes their intent to fuel blockchain research in the country.

The (DOE) Office of Fossil Energy (FE) has announced a grant of up to $4.8 million in federal funding, for the purpose of research and development (R&D) of projects involving blockchain technology.

The announcement was made under the funding opportunity announcement (FOA) DE-FOA-0001991, University Training and Research for Fossil Energy Applications.

With an intent to develop and encourage innovation in science and technology, particularly in the fossil energy sector, this funding has been declared under the FE’s University Training and Research initiative. This project also hopes to bring about greater participation of under-represented students in such research.

Blockchain has emerged as the technology of the future which is being implemented in the present. No country is willing to be left behind at this juncture, when it comes to developments in science and innovation.

The DoE wants to bring about development of cutting edge technologies that can transform the energy sector. One of the desired change is more affordable energy, which can be achieved through modifying the electrical grid systems.

This funding that is forthcoming from the DoE is usually allotted to development in computing systems for coal-fired plants for analytical processing, water reprocessing and environmental sciences. However, this time around, the DoE is also looking into blockchain in to ensure

“secure process signal data and other information flows within distributed sensor networks for fossil-based power generation systems”.

The DoE has some significant experience with blockchain technology. To begin with, they have already approved a $1 million USD grant to a Colorado blockchain company, Grid7, for the purpose of developing a decentralized energy grid.

Also back in January 2018, the DoE had teamed up with BlockCypher, a blockchain company based in California. They jointly developed a multi blockchain system for energy bill settlements. Investment and interest in the technology by federal departments could really help it grow.