The Offtaker side

In the M3tering Protocol, the offtaker is typically a commercial building, a household, utility company, or any entity with electricity demand that wants to procure clean energy from the decentralized solar energy providers within the protocol in exchange for reliable energy supply or competitive electricity rates. To access the clean electricity, the offtaker pre-pays for the energy in xDAI.

DAI is an algorithmic stablecoin issued by MakerDAO, an Ethereum based protocol, that seeks to maintain an exact ratio of one-to-one with U.S. dollar.

The price of electricity per unit (kWh) for an offtaker, also known as the tariff, is typically decided in the power purchase agreement and encoded in the M3tering smart contract, a self-executing program on the blockchain that manages energy payments based on the tariff. When the offtaker pre-pays, the smart contract computes the offtakers energy purchase based on the tariff. The smart meter device Maxwell, then automatically tracks the offtakers energy consumption up until they have used up their energy purchaed before needing to pay again.

While the typically behavior of the offtaker in the protocol is electricity consumption, they could also have an additional role in locations where net metering or feed-in tariffs are in place. In such locations, the offtaker can send excess energy to the grid and receive credits or discounts on their utility bill. This creates an opportunity for them to benefit from a price arbitrage between their M3tering tariff and the feed-in tariff from the utility, all while contributing to decentralize their electricity grid.

Unlocking network effects

Discover how positive network effects in the M3tering Protocol is captured using tokenomics, to the benefit of both the Providers and Offtakers. Dive in here!