Project Coordinator (EU) :
Technical University of CataloniaCountry of the EU Coordinator :
SpainOrganisation Type :
AcademiaProject participants :
EU
Leandro Navarro, is Professor at the Department of Computer Architecture of the Technical University of Catalonia (UPC).
US
Rohi Sukhia, is director of Obada LLC, the Open Blockchain for Asset Disposition Architecture, and CEO of Tradeloop, a EE graduate of Cornell University and Intel Corp.
Ronald S. Lembke, Associate Professor of Supply Chain Management, Chair of the Managerial Sciences Department, College of Business, University of Nevada, Reno.
State of US partner :
NevadaDecentralized data ecosystem for the Open Blockchain for Asset Disposition Alliance
Experiment description
We need effective circular market ecosystems capable of reusing ICT devices, extending their lifespan for new uses, instead of always manufacturing new ones, through reuse, repair, and ensure final recycling in a sustainable way. The collaboration takes place between the industrial experience of OBADA, the knowledge about the reverse supply chain of electronics at the University of Nevada-Reno in USA with the NGI eReuse-Ledger testbed in Europe. It offers an experimental distributed ledger for traceability that does not store details but only proofs (hashes) and economic deposits for devices as incentives. It is privacy-preserving while ensuring the trust, verifiability, irreversibility, tamper proof required safety properties for environmental accountability. The experimental results provide insights about performance and scalability as well as test the design of the operations and parameters of public API to record key operations.
Implementation plan :
The implementation will be coordinated among UPC, UNR, and OBADA that represent the circular market ecosystem of digital devices.
The first task consists on the preparation for the experiment: development of training materials and activities on testbed usage, setup of support mechanisms, discussion of tools and preparation of interfaces frontend to testbed backend.
The second task consists on the execution of the 1st experimental phase: basic technology integration, functional tests front-end with back-end to ensure minimal operation. Initial validation relies on tests with a small users set and devices. The performance and quality evaluation will depends on battery of request and storage of a number of proof device.
Third task consist in the analysis of the results.
The fourth task consists on the execution of the 2nd experimental phase of extended technology and business integration, with a comprehensive evaluation of performance and quality, impact of alternative options, and scalability analysis.
The fifth task consists on the analysis of results and reporting, including release of updated FOSS code, writing of specifications, publications.
The sixth task consists on outreach activities about dissemination of results and innovations, standardization, exploitation.
Impacts :
Impact 1: Enhanced EU – US cooperation in Next Generation Internet, including policy cooperation
Policy cooperation enhanced through the work on the global UN ITU-T L.GDSPP initiative with additional interest and support from Orange and Huawei European organizations, as well as Apple or CISCO from US. Support through the UNE Spanish standardisation organization in the voting for ISO to start a new related work item. Collaboration and expanded participation in the Obada initiative with US partners but also interest from additional EU partner organizations. These recommendations/standards can help policy concertation across both regions.
This policy cooperation is particularly relevant in the context of climate change, the IPCCC recommendations, the ITU-T L.1470 translation to the required reductions in the ICT sector, that translate into policy initiatives like the Digital product passport (in Europe lead by the EC, and globally lead by the ITU-T L.GDSPP work item started in this project), as well as the European Green Deal and equivalent Green New Deal initiatives around the world at the same time there are initiatives for post-pandemic recovery that build on green innovation.
Impact 2: Reinforced collaboration and increased synergies between the Next Generation Internet and the Tomorrow's Internet programmes
Our US research partner at UNR works in life-cycle sustainability for computing particularly how it pertains to topics in computer systems research, but NSF considers that interest is not compatible with the referenced DCL. They are exploring “sustainability” programs (sustainable computing) at NSF to enhance the US research side. No results yet as the program has not yet developed completely. However, the exploration with NSF has raised awareness about the topic there, and we expect resulting in enabling future collaboration with our US partners.
Impact 3: Developing interoperable solutions and joint demonstrators, contributions to standards
Continued and closer collaboration beyond the limits of the NGI Atlantic project, through coordinated experiments that lead to refinement of the business model, integrated demonstrator systems, and the development of APIs for interoperability.
Definitely this work leads to interoperable solutions and standards (linked to the L.GDSPP work item started, potentially and eventually an ISO work item if approved). We had discussions about joint API specifications and interoperability tests to improve the performance and functionality of the current prototype demonstrator.
Impact 4: An EU - US ecosystem of top researchers, hi-tech start-ups / SMEs and Internet-related communities collaborating on the evolution of the Internet
The EU-US ecosystem has expanded through the participants in the eReuse (more than 20 social organizations), Obada 7 /OBS and ITU-T L.GDSPP participants.
Results :
- Polish, demonstrate and validate the USA client software part that implements the business model with the EU part that implements the experimental blockchain backend.
- Develop an international interoperable public specification and standard API for a distributed ledger for traceability of ICT devices, with a validated reference implementation.
- Validate data flows and economic flows between frontend and backend system.
- Technical validation of the API: operations, interoperability with at least one client system or ideally two, performance assessment, support for an economic sustainable service (fees), generation of impact reports from ledger data.
Future Plan :
Future work consists on expanding the functionality of the testbed and its API (with support from the NGI Trublo project), contribute to have a system demonstrator with expanded functionality that can motivate different stakeholders in industry and society for digitized accountability of digital devices in the context of environmental sustainability and climate change mitigation, optimization of the testbed components for better performance and scalability, and finally contribution of the lessons learned to public specifications as with the work in ITU-T or ISO.