Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak has launched Efforce, a blockchain-based energy efficiency crowdfunding platform.

Efforce, styled as “the first blockchain-based energy saving platform”, is designed to enable contributors to support energy efficiency projects by investing in tokenised future savings. These funds are delivered to companies to support energy efficiency projects with the resultant savings written on the blockchain from where they are redistributed to the investors. The model draws on the crowdfunding model popular in the early days of blockchain and the traditional ESCO model for funding energy efficiency projects in which returns on investment accrue through energy performance contracts, i.e. the savings the energy efficiency improvements deliver.

Energy efficiency has considerable potential in the future energy system. In 2019 the market reached $250 billion, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). While there has been a slowdown in the current year, growth will continue. The IEA has projected energy efficiency to deliver almost half of the reduction in energy-related greenhouse gas emissions over the next 20 years in its scenario targeting full achievement of the international climate and energy goals. Energy efficiency upgrades can readily run into the millions of dollars. But the main challenges occur for the smaller amounts of hundreds of thousands of dollars, which are the requirement of many SMEs but outside the scope of the higher value investment funds. Efforce says in its white paper , that the intention is to make investment in energy efficiency “fluid and accessible”, overcoming factors such as a typical minimum investment requirement of $250,000 and lack of technical knowledge on energy systems or funding uncertainties. Efforce has apparently been some years in […]

Image: Efforce