The need for a protocol for electricity

March 25, 2025

The Hidden Dependence on Electricity

We take electricity for granted. It’s always there, running in the background. Yet it was never built for the internet age. The grid has one core function: when energy flows in, it has to flow out. Very little can be stored. So there’s a constant, delicate balance between supply and demand.

But now, we have the internet. More specifically, we have crypto. A good protocol or network does two things: communicates and transacts. That’s exactly what electricity needs. It was built to move power from plants to users—without the live coordination or transparent ledger we see in modern payment systems.

What Electricity Can Learn from Payments

Think about payments before Visa or UPI. Small transactions were a chore. You had to carry cash or keep track of multiple methods. Then these networks arrived, and suddenly making or receiving payments was easy. Economies opened up. In the same way, an electricity protocol could transform how we buy, sell, and manage power.

Barriers to Innovation in the Energy Sector

But it won’t happen automatically. The crypto world lacks experienced electricity asset managers. Meanwhile, electricity hardware is locked in proprietary ecosystems. These walled gardens hinder innovation.

Our Solution: A Unified Electricity Protocol

We set out to fix this. We have built hardware that can talk to multiple solar inverters. It can handle crypto as well. That means payments for solar power can flow on-chain. It’s a template that could work for EV charging, utility bills, and even microgrids.

Consider the possibilities. You drive up to any EV charger, plug in, and pay with a single app. No more hopping between provider apps. Utilities could settle bills automatically, with the meter itself making transactions. Even more interesting are add-ons like energy-related insurance. If your solar inverter goes down, the system could trigger automatic claims and payouts. That means no paperwork, just an instant transaction backed by the protocol.

Decentralized Grid Management: A Vision for the Future

Decentralized grid management becomes more than an idea. The protocol can reward you for discharging your home battery when demand spikes. It can also verify that the energy you’re feeding in is green. Over time, such incentives could go global, creating a “virtual grid” that overlays our physical networks.

At NRG, our vision is to finance clean energy assets, bring them on-chain, and make them part of a self-reinforcing loop. Our protocol will speak to existing hardware and gradually open these closed environments. That’s how we imagine the future: a unified electricity interface, powered by crypto, that makes energy smarter, cleaner, and simpler for everyone.

Share the Post: