Maritime Blockchain Labs (MBL), a partnership established by Lloyd’s Register Foundation and BLOC, has announced that its first demonstrator project, a fuel provenance register for the maritime sector, is set to enter a phase of further development.
MBL, which explores the applications of blockchain for the assurance and safety of critical infrastructure, expects the register to provide trusted information about fuel origin, journey and characteristics.
According to a statement, the next step for the solution is proving it can be scaled, enabling the platform to capture fuel deliveries and associated verified data.
MBL’s platform provides a chain of custody on quality and quantity documentation points for interested stakeholders within the supply chain, which in turn will provide a decision support system around marine fuels.
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It is intended that this development phase will be undertaken by a consortium formed of ship owners, fuel suppliers, port authorities and a fuel testing body, with MBL inviting interest from stakeholders to participate.
A prototype digital system, providing fuel assurance for ship owners and suppliers, has already been developed in 2018 with a consortium including the International Bunker Industry Association (IBIA), LR’s FOBAS team, Bostomar, Heidmar, BIMCO, Goodfuels and Precious Shipping.
The creation of a marine fuels quality tracing and compliance prototype involved testing in a simulated environment, which took place in September 2018.
This prototype was ultimately used for the manual capture of the world’s first end to end fuel transaction on a blockchain in the Port of Rotterdam.
Great to talk with @MaerskGrowth's @saxberg about how #blockchain technologies can help de-risk marine fuel supply chains. It’s been a big week for #IMO2020 – now we need to collaborate and build the solutions. pic.twitter.com/mmaRdTirh1
— BLOC (@un_BLOC) October 30, 2018
Deanna MacDonald, CEO of BLOC, commented: “The recently concluded MEPC73 showed us that there are still burning questions about the availability of compliant fuels post-2020 – and the current epidemic of bad bunker, as it’s been called by Intertanko and others, shows that building traceability and trust in the marine fuels supply chain is one of the most vital issues facing shipping right now.
“Our demonstrator phase has shown us that dealing with marine fuels’ quality and quantity assurance is an industry wide issue, and that the industry is looking to work together to solve this issue.
“We’ve built something that for the first time, will allow stakeholders across the global shipping industry to verify and validate transactions across the fuels supply chain.”
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