In our previous article we introduced the concept of Shared Audit Trails. In this article we will introduce Trust Trail, a project that makes use of shared audit trails and blockchain technology for carbon capture processes. Trust Trail was developed to address the complexity of carbon capture technologies and its multi-participant supply chain, which is susceptible to breaches of integrity. The system uses blockchain technology to store proofs and attestations in an immutable shared audit trail. This is a preview of the current state of the software showing the processing of bio mass in different steps up to the creation of a Carbon Removal Credit (certificate).

On our overview you see a list of assets, bio mass, energy, biogas, biochar and carbon removal credits (CRCs). Principally, any kind of asset can be configured, so other custom business processed from other fields, like financial or supply chain applications, are possible too.

In this example, we will look at the carbon capture supply chain use case. In the beginning there is a bio mass provider. This can be any kind of company that has material that would release carbon emissions, for example wood chips or cow dung. The bio mass provider will therefore at first create a piece of bio mass, Biomass #8945, in the Trust Trail Dashboard. A description can be added to give additional details about the asset.

Every write interaction, like the creation of a new piece of bio mass needs to be irreversibly documented in the blockchain. The user needs to authenticate themselves in the Trust Trail Software to approve the creation of a new bio mass asset. Afterwards, the hash of the new bio mass asset is written to the block chain. Additionally, the entire bio mass asset, including the name, description and other attributes is written to the Fiware context broker. In an audit, the auditor could retrieve the bio mass asset from the Fiware Context Broker, generate a hash of the asset and then compare it with the hash that was written to the blockchain. If the hash matches, the auditor knows the bio mass is in its original genuine condition. If it was tampered with or manipulated, then the hash would not match and it would be obvious that something is wrong. Using blockchain technology in this process ensures trust transparency and auditability.

The integrity and ownership is also illustrated in the Trust Trail Dashboard. In the Integrity tab you can see which Data Provider provided the data object and which hash was written to the block chain. Furthermore, the ownership can be verified, the owner and the tokenId are listed.

To enable easy auditablity on the block chain, the block scout link to the transaction that was written to the blockchain is provided. On block scout all the data of the transaction can be audited, like the timestamp and the hash that was written to the blockchain, as well as from which account the transaction originated. As the block chain is decentralized, there is no single party that has control over it which ensures that the audit trail can not be manipulated later and is therefore trustworthy.

In order to perform pyrolysis, the process to turn a piece of bio mass into bio char, energy is needed. Therefore, an energy provider needs to provide energy, so we are creating a 2kwh energy asset on the Trust Trail Dashboard that can later be used for pyrolysis.

As before, the energy provider needs to use their Trust Trail account to approve the business process, the creation of the energy asset. The created Energy asset can be audited in the same way using the details from the Energy Details Page and the block scout explorer link to the block chain transaction.

Now that we have energy and bio mass, we create a piece of bio char using the activity pyrolysis. This step would be performed by the Pyrolysis Plant. The piece of bio mass (wood chips for example) would have been delivered to the Pyrolysis Plant by a logistics company and the energy provided by the energy provider. The Pyrolysis Plant would log in to the Trust Trail Dashboard and do this in a 4 step process in the "Consume Assets via a new activity" view. In the first step the user selects the category of the activity, which is "pyrolysis".

In the second step the input assets need to be selected to perform the pyrolysis, which is bio mass and energy. First, the Biomass #8945 is selected.

Second, the Pyrolysis Plant selects the energy asset, Energy #8945.

Now everything is available to perform pyrolysis. Consequently, In the third step, the Pyrolysis Plant performs the pyrolysis and a piece of bio char is created, to document the outputs, a bio char asset is created in the Trust Trail Dashboard.

In the next screen the output is summarized. In some processes, there are side products that are created. In pyrolysis not only bio char but bio gas is created. This is illustrated in the screen above.

In the fourth step, the Confirm screen, the Pyrolysis Plant user needs to confirm the creation of all 5 steps of the process:

1) Updating the consumedVia relation of the bio mass, so that it is transparent on the block chain what was done with the bio mass asset #8945.
2) Updating the consumedVia relation of the energy, so that it is transparent on the block chain what was done with the energy asset #8945.
3) Creating the activity pyrolysis on the block chain.
4) Creating the output, bio char on the block chain.
5) Creating the output, bio gas on the block chain, the side product of the pyrolysis activity.

The confirmation is done on the blockchain for auditability and to ensure trust in the activity having been performed in the correct way.

The activity details can then be viewed on the Details Page and audited in the same way like the assets. Additionally, the graph on the right side can be used to get a good overview of the process. The user can easily see, which activity was performed, what were the input assets that the activity consumed and what was the resulting output assets that were produced in the activity.

The data objects are illustrated using the NGSI-LD standard. In our example, the activity "pyrolysis" consumed the asset "biomass" and the asset "energy" and it then produced the asset "biochar" and the asset "biogas" from the activity. Our example is relatively straight forward but industrial processes often have many different inputs, outputs and multiple activities, which can get confusing. The graphic supports the auditor in more complex scenarios to perform the audit in an efficient manner.

In the Details View of the bio char an analysis lab could now create a claim based on an analysis of the bio char that the pyrolysis plant created.

The claim can be an analysis certificate that certifies a carbon content of the bio char of 8kg. Other claims could be a storage provider for carbon capture receiving the bio char and creating a claim for having stored it securely in their facility.

To ensure authenticity and integrity, the analysis lab user uses the Trust Trail Software to write the claim to the blockchain and approves the transaction.

In the very end of the process a Carbon Removal Credit in the form of a certificate is created. This is done by a sequester that receives the bio char and stores it in a secure facility and creates a Carbon Removal Credit.

The Creation of a Carbon Removal Credit is an activity with 4 steps again. In the first step the category is selected which is sequestration.

In the second step the input for the sequestration activity is selected, which is the bio char.

In the third step, the output of the sequestration activity is selected, this is the Carbon Removal Credit (carbon certificate).

In the fourth step, the sequester user has to confirm the activity and it is written to the blockchain for auditability and integrity.

As a result a Carbon Removal Credit is created, which is essentially a carbon certificate. The possibilities are endless, such carbon certificates could later be traded on carbon certificate market places, where they could be acquired by companies that are looking to buy carbon certificates.

The claims are what provides the trust to the created assets in the process. The activities and assets can be customized. Multi-step processes with an arbitrary number of assets are possible and can illustrate complex industrial processes. Trust Trail is kept generic and can be used for use cases from financial, chemical and many more domains. In any process, in which multiple participants are involved and trust needs to be created, the shared audit trail from the Trust Trail Platform can provide trust, integrity and auditability.

Trust Trail is a part of the CAST project under the i4Trust 2nd Open Call, in which Fiware and iShare integration are added to the value proposition.

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