Bitcoin mining is a major global energy user, estimated by the Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance to have consumed over 121 TWh of electricity in 2023. This energy use translates into negative climate impact - but not all mining operations contribute equally to it. Climate-conscious mining operations are contributing to grid decarbonization by purchasing renewable energy, strategically locating mining operations in low-carbon grids, and participating in demand flexibility programs.
The Green Proofs for Bitcoin (GP4BTC) platform is a solution to bring consistent metrics and much-needed transparency into the climate impacts of individual Bitcoin mining companies so industry stakeholders can make better decisions to align with a net-zero future. GP4BTC offers a certification program for climate-conscious miners and one-stop shop for companies seeking to transact with them. Using GP4BTC's self-sovereign approach to data-sharing, market participants such as exchanges and payment processors can discover, validate, and compare the sustainability credentials of participating miners and launch innovative programs to recognize and reward climate-aligned mining.
In April, 2024, Energy Web announced a strategic collaboration with PayPal's Blockchain Research Group to deliver cryptoeconomic incentives to climate-aligned miners using the GP4BTC platform. For more details, please read the project whitepaper here.
For miners interested in applying for GP4BTC certification or needing assistance navigating the GP4BTC platform, please refer to the Miner Guide.
Building a registry for clean commodity certificates: Today many commodities—from electricity to liquid fuels, steel or aluminum, or even digital assets—are adopting technologies to reduce their carbon footprint. Commodities that are produced in a sustainable manner can be differentiated from conventionally produced alternatives if they can be digitally tracked throughout their lifecycles.
Green Proofs has been implemented in several of these use cases already:
This Miner User Guide walks through the steps required to connect with the GP4BTC dApp, apply for certification, and share your certification publicly.
If you encounter any issues using the GP4BTC Certification Platform, or have questions/feedback on this guide, please contact gp4btc@energyweb.org.
GP4BTC users must use the MetaMask wallet to log into the GP4BTC dApp and sign transactions (including the submission of certification data).
We recommend using Chrome (or Chromium-based, e.g. Brave) or Firefox desktop browsers to interact with the dApp. To download MetaMask plugin to your browser, you can use the links below;
Chrome (or Chromium-based): https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/metamask/nkbihfbeogaeaoehlefnkodbefgpgknn
Go to Settings > Networks and click Add Network button to add Energy Web Chain. Enter the details below to add Energy Web Chain as a new network.
You can also use ChainList to quickly add Energy Web Chain as a new network to your MetaMask. To use this tool, please follow this link and click “Add to MetaMask” button.
Select Energy Web Chain from the dropdown (by default, the Ethereum Mainnet will be selected) before navigating to the GP4BTC dApp homepage.
The GP4BTC dApp does not require users to hold or spend Energy Web Tokens (EWT) in order to sign messages or acquire credentials.
After navigating to the URL above, click on the Use MetaMask button on the welcome screen of the GP4BTC dApp to log in.
The MetaMask plug-in will pop up in the top right corner of the browser and request a signature to log in.
If you are logging in with a MetaMask account, you will be prompted to sign the message in the MetaMask Extension.
If you are logging in with a hardware wallet account (via MetaMask), you will also be prompted to connect to your hardware wallet and sign the message on that device.
After providing the signature, you will be logged in into GP4BTC dApp.
The first step in applying for GP4BTC certification is to verify your email address.
The GP4BTC dApp requires registering and verifying a valid email address in order to log in.
After entering your email on the dedicated text input area, click the Submit button. This will initiate another prompt to sign a message in order to trigger a verifiable credential request.
For more information on the use verifiable credentials in GP4BTC, refer to Energy Web’s Identity and Access Management documentation.
After signing the message, you will receive an email in your inbox that will prompt you to confirm your email address:
After clicking the “Confirm My Email Address” button in the email, an email verification credential will be issued to the user and you will be redirected to a confirmation landing page. From there, click the Return to Homepage button to navigate to the GP4BTC homepage.
When you return to the GP4BTC homepage, it should now show the Credential Inbox page and the other pages you will need to access to move forward with your certification application.
Once you have confirmed your email address, GP4BTC will ask for basic Know-Your-Customer details about your organization.
Navigate to the “Apply for Credentials” page from the navigation bar on the left to access the Company KYC credential request form.
Descriptions of each field can be found in the table below. Fields marked “( * )” are mandatory.
After filling all the mandatory fields, click Submit button and use the MetaMask wallet to sign and send the credential request.
Once you have submitted the Company KYC form, an Energy Web auditor will review your information and issue a Company KYC Credential to your account.
After issuance, you can view the details of this credential on the Credential Inbox page.
Once you have submitted your Company KYC form, an auditor will review in approximately 2 to 5 business days. The auditor may contact you directly if additional information and/or documentation is required.
Once you have received your Company KYC Credential, you can proceed with the Energy Evaluation. In the Energy Evaluation, you will provide details about your company’s energy use during the years for which you are applying to be certified.
Currently, companies can apply for GP4BTC Certification for the years 2021 and 2022. To learn more about certification, scores, and methodology visit https://gp4btc.org/methodology/
Navigate to the “Apply for Credentials” page from the navigation bar on the left to access the Energy Evaluation credential request form.
Descriptions of each field can be found in the table below. Fields marked “( * )” are mandatory.
After filling in all the mandatory fields, click the Submit button and use MetaMask to sign and send the credential request.
Once you have submitted the Energy Evaluation form, an Energy Web auditor will review your information and issue an Energy Evaluation Credential.
After issuance, you can view the details of this credential on the Credential Inbox page.
Once you have submitted your Energy Evaluation form, an auditor will review in approximately 2 to 5 business days. The auditor may contact you directly if additional information and/or documentation is required.
The final step in the certification application process is to provide details on your mining activities. GP4BTC uses this information to validate that the energy consumption you have reported for a given year aligns with the mining rewards you have received in that year. This section is not required for companies that exclusively provide hosting services to other companies.
PLEASE NOTE: Unlike the information submitted in the Company KYC and Energy Evaluation sections, Mining Evaluation data cannot be shared publicly in the miner profile or other data sharing tools. Energy Web will keep information that is submitted in the Mining Evaluation confidential, as described in the Green Proofs for Bitcoin Terms and Conditions and Energy Web’s Privacy Policy.
Navigate to the “Apply for Credentials” page from the navigation bar on the left to access the Mining Evaluation credential request form.
The user should fill all the inputs marked with ( * ). Descriptions about each field can be found on the table below.
The most widely-used ASIC models are included in the dropdown list. If your ASIC model is not listed, you can select the “Other” option from the dropdown list to enter a manual ASIC model name.
After filling all the mandatory fields, click the Submit button and use MetaMask to sign and send the credential request.
Once you have submitted the Mining Evaluation form, an Energy Web auditor will review your information and issue a Mining Evaluation Credential.
After issuance, you can view the details of this credential on the Credential Inbox page.
Once you have submitted your Mining Evaluation form, an auditor will review in approximately 2 to 5 business days. The auditor may contact you directly if additional information and/or documentation is required.
Once you have competed the Company KYC, Energy Evaluation, and Mining Evaluation forms, the GP4BTC auditor will review your application and determine your Clean Energy and Grid Impact Scores for the certification year. If either score is equal to or greater than 50, you will be eligible for GP4BTC certification and will be prompted to complete the following steps.
The Certifications page will be visible once the user has completed the Company KYC, Energy Evaluation, and Mining Evaluation forms and obtained those credentials for the certification year.
After navigating to the “Certifications” page, select the year for which to request certification from the dropdown menu.
Clicks the Request Certification button to send a certification request.
After issuance, you can view your certificate details along with your Clean Energy and Grid Impact scores.
Once your organization has been certified, you will be given the option to share your certification(s) and/or underlying data via a public profile page.
The data sharing page will be visible once the user has obtained the Company KYC, Energy Evaluation, and Mining Evaluation credentials and has been issued their GP4BTC certification(s).
After navigating to the “Data Sharing” page, select a year for which to create a public page.
On the form, you can select which information should be listed on the public profile. To create a public profile, you must share your company’s name, website, logo (if provided), and certification status. Sharing of all other data (including scores, facility locations, energy use, etc) is at your discretion.
After setting your profile preferences, you can preview the profile page before publishing it.
After you created a public profile page for your organization you have an option to update the data sharing settings any time.
After navigating to the “Data Sharing” page, you may create and manage a public page for each year that you have earned certification.
On the form, select which information should be included/hidden from the public profile page including company’s name, website and logo (if provided).
After updating your preferences, you can preview the public profile page before publishing it.
Why I need to sign two times when sending a credential request?
→ GP4BTC uses two credential types as part of Energy Web’s IAM stack (you can read more in detail here) therefore requires users to sign two messages when sending an enrollment request (email verification, company overview, energy evaluation, mining evaluation) in order to obtain both of the credential types.
Why I need to sign to share my profile settings?
→ GP4BTC requires a signature to store user’s data sharing settings into a verifiable credential and another signature to transport user’s data to backend application to serve the data publicly. GP4BTC only transports the data that a miner has agreed to share in the data sharing settings for her public profile. Miners may update data sharing settings any time. Updating your profile will remove old data from the GP4BTC backend.
Network Name
Energy Web Chain
New RPC URL
Chain ID
246
Currency Symbol (optional)
EWT
Block Explorer URL (optional)
dApp URL
Input
Description
Contact Name ( * )
Your name (or the name of the designated representative of your company)
Mining Company Name ( * )
Name of your company
Mining Company Logo (optional)
Your company’s logo
Corporate ID Number ( * )
Identification number for your company (e.g. Employer Identification Number, VAT Registration Number, etc.)
Mining Company Website ( * )
Your company’s website
Registered Address ( * )
Your company’s registered address
Company Type ( * )
The user should select one option from below that describes the company best;
Mining Company (owns and operates mining hardware)
Hosting Company (hosts and operates mining hardware owned by others)
Both
Others (please provide input)
Input
Description
Label ( * )
Name of the mining or hosting facility
Address ( * )
The address field uses an auto-complete feature. Please select an address from the list provided.
Total energy consumed by this mining operation ( * )
This is the total amount of electricity consumed at this facility during the year for which you are applying for certification
Is this facility enrolled in one or more grid flexibility programs? ( * )
GP4BTC certification recognizes miners that pursue sustainability strategies driven by participation in grid flexibility / demand response / demand side management programs. In the context of GP4BTC, grid flexibility refers to a program operated by a utility or grid operator to reduce system demand or deliver other beneficial grid services (such as peak shaving, voltage support, ancillary reserves, frequency regulation, etc.) via voluntary, temporary, and deliberate modifications in customer electricity usage. A market-based demand response program is one in which customers are compensated for modifying consumption in response to a request from the utility/grid operator. Enrollment in time-of-use or wholesale tariffs and participation in emergency load management programs (e.g. Flex Alerts in CAISO or Conservation Alerts in ERCOT) are not considered to be market-based demand response activities for the purposes of GP4BTC certification.
Was this facility dispatched to provide demand flexibility or grid services in 20YY?
( * )
See row above.
Instrument purchased
If you purchased energy attribute certificates (EACs) for the certification year, please enter the type (e.g. REC, I-REC, GO, TIGR, etc). If you did not purchase EACs, enter “N/A”
Unit quantity (MWh)
Enter the quantity of EACs purchased, in MWh. If you did not purchase EACs, enter “0.”
Renewable facility location
Enter the name and address of the renewable facility location from which the instruments were purchased. If you did not purchase EACs, enter “N/A.”
Group
Input
Description
Mining Rewards
Company Ownership ( * )
Please select the ownership structure of your company from the list below:
Private Company
Public Company
Mining Rewards
Bitcoin Wallet Address / Earnings Statement ( * )
If you are a private company, please provide your bitcoin mining payout address(es) associated with the mining facilities you are applying for certification.
If you are a public company, please provide an audited/public earnings statement for the certification year.
N/A
Total BTC mining rewards
Please provide the total BTC mined by your company in the certification year.
Please list the ASIC models (and number of each model) used by your company to mine BTC
Maker/Model
Please list the make/model and number of units of each ASIC type you used to mine BTC as of December 31 of the certification year.
Number of units
See Above
What mining pool(s) did you mine with?
Mining pool
Please provide the name(s) of the mining pool(s) that you mined with in the certification year. If you do not wish to provide this information, mark this field “N/A”
Building a traceability platform for 24/7 renewable electricity tracking and matching: Enterprise energy consumers are interested in accurately measuring (and mitigating) their carbon footprint through the procurement of renewable electricity. One strategy to accomplish this is to track their electricity consumption and match it with locally available renewable electricity on an hourly basis. Many established tracking systems for renewable electricity fail to provide this level granularity: today most renewable certificates are issued at a monthly interval at best, and often annually. Green Proofs can be used to create a digital platform with the following functionalities:
· Digital onboarding of all parties
· Collection of granular (e.g. hourly, sub-hourly) generation and consumption data 24/7
· Verification of the sources of data by checking the DID of the data provider
· Performing of matching of generation and consumption data based on predefined logic (e.g. preferences of buyers, prioritization of assignment of available supply)
· Decentralized validation of the matching results by multiple eligible actors (worker nodes)
· Issuance, transfer and redemption of EACs via immutable, tamper-proof, and auditable digital certificates
· Reporting: customizable user interfaces and reporting tools to visualize and export different metrics for generators and consumers.
Historically, the easiest way for an organization to claim it is powered by clean energy is to purchase renewable energy certificates (RECs) from third party renewable energy generators. RECs represent the environmental attributes of the renewable energy produced and are sold separately from the actual electricity, typically on an annual basis. RECs have been beneficial for the development of renewables, but they fail to truly account for the carbon impact of an organization’s electricity consumption. A more accurate way to decarbonize operations is to match actual electricity consumption with available renewable generation within the same grid on a real-time, continuous basis. Energy Web’s 24/7 Green Proof solution is capable of tracking and matching consumption and generation within a granular time frame, moving from a yearly or monthly basis (with RECs) to an hourly or sub-hourly basis.
The role of workers in a 24x7 solution is to execute a matching algorithm that assigns renewable generation to specific customers (consumption centers) to improve accuracy and reliability of clean energy accounting.
First, workers establish a registry of known renewable generators (or data providers who own/operate multiple generators) and end-customers (i.e. individual load centers that want to account for their electricity consumption) using pseudonymous identifiers. In this architecture, each worker only “knows” the list of approved IDs, not the real-world information about the entities.
Upon authentication, eligible workers fetch consumption and generation data independently from external data sources via API. The frequency of this process depends on the desired granularity for matching (hourly is most common, but currently workers can support matching at one minute intervals).
Workers run the matching logic to match consumption and generation data based on the predefined algorithm. The matching algorithm factors in parameters such as the volume of renewable generation in the current time step, the volume of electricity consumption, consumer preferences (e.g. price they are willing to pay for renewables, preferences for specific types of generation like solar vs. wind, etc.), and any other rules that govern matching within that market.
The consensus among workers triggers the issuance of granular renewable electricity certificates for that time interval and transfer / retirement of these certificates to the given consumer.
Every worker creates a hash of the result using the keccak256 (SHA-3) hash algorithm. Thus, every single match is transformed into a Merkle Tree. Then from all transformed matches are nested within another top-level Merkle Tree - the hashed result of each voting round. The advantage of using this technique is the ability to verify what's inside each hash without revealing any properties to the public.
The purpose of using worker nodes for 24x7 matching is to have a robust system for being able to verify computations and results without having to trust one single party. The idea is to allow multiple parties to process the same data and logic independently. If a majority of these parties arrive at the same result, then the computations are very likely to be true and can be trusted. These events (consensus and derived results) can then be anchored on the blockchain to have an audit trail for further verifiability of results. Another advantage is redundancy. If one worker is down for whatever reason, then there are multiple other parties to fetch and process the data. This helps avoid downtime of a system and smooth user experience.
The SAFc Registry was the first production Green Proofs registry launched in Q4'2023 as a collaboration between Energy Web, SABA, RMI, and EDF to decarbonize the aviation industry.
Sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) is jet fuel produced from renewable feedstocks that emits significantly less carbon than petroleum-based jet fuel. For SAF producers, it is important to track the origin and attributes of the SAF to create new revenues by selling these attributes to environmentally conscious airlines and corporations. For airlines and consumers of air transport services, having a verifiable audit trail of SAF origin and attributes helps them implement credible decarbonization strategies.
The SAFc Registry follows the "book-and-claim" chain of custody model, once the SAF is "booked" in the registry, its environmental attributes are may move separately from the physical fuel. The registry tracks key information about the underlying SAF production, including who produced the fuel, what sustainability certifications they hold, the fuel's feedstock (e.g., waste cooking oil), how much SAF was produced (measured in tonnes), its estimated carbon savings per unit of fuel, when the SAF was blended with conventional aviation fuel, etc.
The SAFc Registry offers the following to its users:
Organizations and individuals can easily join the platform and create accounts with specific abilities based on the type of company they represent
"Fuel Providers" are special organizations - that produce SAF and hold 3rd party certifications - that can provide generation / production data to the platform for to issue SAF certificates (SAFc)
All data fields represented on the platform stem from 3rd-party verified information and certifications, and SAFc may only be issued by accounts holding the proper credentials
The Registry's web-interface is very user-friendly and familiar to corporate users; power users may interact with the platform via API
Worker nodes on Energy Web X provide transparency into the inner-workings of certificate issuances, transfers, and redemptions. This allows registry users, stakeholders, and the public to trust that the registry is operating with integrity.
The role of workers in a SAF registry is to govern the lifecycle of SAF certificates, which are linked to each tonne of SAF produced.
The volume of SAF certificates must precisely match the actual volume of SAF produced in the real world. Accordingly, to issue certificates a Fuel Provider must first prove that they are an accredited producer and then prove that it really produced some volume of SAF. Workers need to verify both elements, and then introduce the correct number of certificates to the system.
First, workers establish a registry of accredited producers using pseudonymous identifiers. In this architecture, each worker only “knows” the list of approved IDs, not the real-world information about the company.
Fuel Providers submit requests to issue a volume of SAF certificates using a “Proof of Sustainability” document, which contains all of the important data about the SAF (e.g., number of tonnes or 'units' of SAF, origin, LCA GHG value...). Workers first check if the requestor’s ID matches an active ID in the accredited registry. Then, workers query the POS document and share the production volume via precise proof to check if the request to issue certificates matches the volume in the POS document.
Workers vote to determine if the requestor is valid and the volume is correct; if consensus is reached, the approval triggers a workflow to issue certificate(s). When issuing a certificate the merkle tree root hash of the worker node voting round becomes part of that certificate hash so the consensus of the worker voting is inherently tied to the issuance of the certificate.
Once certificates are issued to Fuel Providers, they want to sell them to buyers like airlines. To transfer a certificate to a buyer, a producer sends a request to the worker pool with the volume to be transferred and the recipient (buyer) ID.
Workers first check to verify that the volume requested in the transfer is equal to or less than the balance held by the producer. For example Producer A has 100 units and wants to sell 50 to Buyer B; workers check that the transfer request is 100 or less and submit votes on the result to approve (or deny) the transfer.
Once the transfer is executed, the workers then vote to update the balance of the producer and buyer. Using pseudonymous IDs, workers can prove that the sum balance of transfers is correct without revealing parties involved (just like one can create many addresses from a public key, you create a bunch of random IDs for participants that link back to a core identifier).
Each issued SAFc has a unique identifier, like an NFT; so the transfers always link back to original issuance. Transfers aren't reflected on-chain though the results of worker votes are.
Eventually, a buyer wants to publicly claim the use of a SAFc and take credit for its avoided emissions. Buyers can claim either whole or fractional portions of SAFc units. Upon executing a process to claim a certificate, workers reference the unique identifier of the certificate and remove it out of the pool of transfers of “active” certificates. Through this process the certificate remains visible but it’s “frozen” and linked to a specific ID and consumption event.
Similar to the selling and transfer process, the role of workers in retirement is to validate that the volume requested is equal to or less than the current balance of the requestor, and then establish consensus on precisely which certificate(s) are being retired.
There are two primary benefits of using worker nodes for SAFc:
Providing full transparency on the total volume of SAFc in the system (keeping track of volumes that are issued, “active”, and retired) without revealing the real-world identities of the entities holding them, or their individual balances.
By linking the voting events to the issuance, transfer, and retirement of each certificate (which itself has a unique identifier) the system provides real-time, continuous auditing of a cohesive balance sheet with double-entry accounting.
One implementation of Green Proofs is the Maritime Book and Claim (MBC) registry created by the Energy Web Foundation in collaboration with and . The MBC registry brings transparency and credibility to claims about the carbon impacts of maritime shipping voyages that use lower-carbon shipping fuels.
Decarbonizing maritime shipping is a critical effort because the sector accounts for some three percent of global emissions.
The registry includes the following main functionalities:
Issuance: The operator or owner of a ship can register the usage of low-emissions fuel. Multiple admins verify the request and approve the issuance of a ceritifcate representing the carbon impact of the fuel.
Transfer: The certificate can be transferred to any actors involved in shipping, including freight forwarders or cargo owners.
Retirement: actors can retire the certificate, which means that they can claim in their sustainability reporting that low-emission fuels have been used in transportation.
Transparency: After actors have retired the certificates, the information becomes public (after sensitive information is removed).
As an example, if you order a pair of shoes online, that pair typically is shipped thousands of kilometers from its place of manufacture to you. The MBC registry allows the various parties involved in the transportation to transparently and credibly show the carbon savings of shipping with sustainable fuels.
