According to TechFlow, Qiao Wang, founder and core contributor of Alliance DAO, published an article titled "Decentralized Energy: Crypto-Enabled Virtual Power Plants", discussing the development prospects of virtual power plants (VPPs) and the potential role of encryption technology.
The article points out that VPPs aggregate and coordinate small energy resources in homes and businesses, such as thermostats, electric vehicles and solar panels, which can be flexibly managed to meet grid needs.
The U.S. Department of Energy predicts that there will be a peak supply-demand gap of approximately 200GW from 2023 to 2030, of which 50-100GW is expected to be solved through VPPs.
China's 14th Five-Year Plan also proposes that by 2030, the demand-side response capacity will reach 5%-6% of the peak load, equivalent to about 100GW.
Qiao Wang believes that encryption technology can help VPPs reach critical mass faster and accelerate network effects. He sees VPPs as energy markets, where the supply side is households and their energy devices, and the demand side is the power grid.
The article also mentioned that Alliance has funded several crypto x energy startups. The latest one is Starpower, a decentralized physical infrastructure network (DePIN) for VPPs, which has sold 20,000 smart home energy devices.
