Modeling Techniques of Distributed Ledger Technologies

This research relates to the field of distributed ledger technologies and their application in the energy industry. Distributed ledger technologies (DLTs) are decentralized technologies for storing, exchanging, and recording information, where synchronization and data exchange is determined by a consensus algorithm, and copies of the data are stored on geographically distributed nodes. Blockchain technology is currently the best known and most researched of them. Meanwhile, blockchain is not the only configuration in which distributed ledger technology can be implemented. Non-blockchain DLTs can be in the form of cryptocurrency or be simply an architecture for storing and exchanging data and have no monetary meaning. Some are seen as being able to replace blockchain because they can process transactions much faster; transactions are added almost instantaneously and processed individually rather than in blocks. The reason alternative types of DLTs are considered useful is that a transaction can be represented by a node, and you can add transactions to the ledger as they arrive. This means that there is no need to wait for a block to be created to validate your transactions. In addition, various types of consensuses developed that reduce latency in the system and increase throughput. However, how reliable and efficient they will be is an open question. This paper investigates distributed ledger technologies when applied to create a distributed smart meter ledger. The behavior of the system is modeled and evaluated using simulation. Keywords: energy, smart meters, smart grid, DLT, directed acyclic graph, random walk, simulation