Upload
others
View
1
Download
0
Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
1
White Paper
January 2018
Version 7.2
2
DISCLAIMER
This document is a technical white paper (the “White Paper”) setting out the current state and future
development plans of the Irene Energy Platform (“Irene”). This White Paper is for information purposes
only and is not a statement of future intent. Nothing in this White Paper shall be deemed to constitute a
prospectus of any sort or a solicitation for investment.
Irene Energy makes no warranties or representations as to the successful development or implementation
of such technologies and innovations, or achievement of any other activities noted in the White Paper,
and disclaims any warranties implied by law or otherwise, to the extent permitted by law. No person is
entitled to rely on the contents of this White Paper or any inferences drawn from it, including in relation
to any interactions with Irene Energy or the technologies mentioned in this White Paper. Irene Energy
disclaims all liability for any loss or damage of whatsoever kind (whether foreseeable or not) which may
arise from any person acting on any information and opinions relating to Irene Energy contained in this
White Paper or any information which is made available in connection with any further enquiries,
notwithstanding any negligence, default or lack of care. Each recipient is to rely solely on its own
knowledge, investigation, judgment and assessment of the matters which are the subject of this White
Paper and any information which is made available in connection with any further enquiries and to satisfy
itself as to the accuracy and completeness of such matters.
Certain information contained in this White Paper constitutes “Forward-looking statements” which can be
identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as “may” “will” “should” “expect” “anticipate”
“target” “Project” “Estimate” “intend” “continue” or “believe” or the negatives therefor or other variations
thereon or comparable terminology. Due to various risks and uncertainties, actual events or results may
differ materially from those reflected or contemplated in such forward-looking statements.
This White Paper is only available on www.irene-crowdsale.com and may not be redistributed,
reproduced or passed on to any other person or published, in part or in whole, for any purpose, without
the prior, written consent of Irene Energy. This White Paper is not directed to, or intended for
distribution to or use by, any person or entity who is a citizen or resident of or located in any state,
country or other jurisdiction where such distribution, publication, availability or use would be contrary to
law or regulation. The manner of distributing this White Paper may be restricted by law or regulation in
certain countries. Persons into whose possession this White Paper may come are required to inform
themselves about and to observe such restrictions. By accessing this White Paper, a recipient hereof
agrees to be bound by the foregoing limitations.
3
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Disclaimer ........................................................................................................................................ 2 Abstract ............................................................................................................................................ 3 1 Market context ......................................................................................................................... 5
1.1 A rising sense of urgency on global warming ....................................................................................... 5 1.2 Increasing customer engagement and awareness ................................................................................. 5 1.3 A twin revolution ....................................................................................................................................... 6 1.4 A $130bn market under siege .................................................................................................................. 7 1.5 Blockchain, a timely solution ................................................................................................................... 8 1.6 Stellar: the right blockchain for Irene Energy ....................................................................................... 9
2 Irene’s value proposition and business model ........................................................................ 10 2.1 Irene, a personal energy supplier ........................................................................................................... 10 2.2 Irene’s value proposition to consumers ............................................................................................... 11 2.3 Irene’s value proposition to producers ................................................................................................ 12 2.4 Irene’s business model ............................................................................................................................ 13 2.5 Data Access and Data Protection ......................................................................................................... 14
3 Irene’s achievements ............................................................................................................... 15 3.1 Client platform ......................................................................................................................................... 15 3.2 Back-office ................................................................................................................................................ 15 3.3 Machine learning-based production forecasting ................................................................................. 16 3.4 Commercial achievements and Partnerships....................................................................................... 18
4 Token technical overview ........................................................................................................ 19 4.1 Introducing The Tellus Coins: the world’s first clean and green token .......................................... 19 4.2 Supply of Tellus ....................................................................................................................................... 21 4.3 Demand for Tellus .................................................................................................................................. 22 4.4 The Tellus Pre-Sale .................................................................................................................................. 23 4.5 Tellus Main Sales I and II ....................................................................................................................... 25 4.6 After the Tellus Pre-Sale and Sales ....................................................................................................... 26
5 Route-to-market ..................................................................................................................... 28 5.1 Geographies .............................................................................................................................................. 28 5.2 Customers ................................................................................................................................................. 28 5.3 Electricity roaming and hyper-decentralization .................................................................................. 29
6 Timeline and roadmap ........................................................................................................... 30 6.1 Q1 2018: Pre-sale ..................................................................................................................................... 30 6.2 Q1-Q4 2018: Technological consolidation & Europe Preparations ............................................... 30 6.3 Q4 2018: Europe Launch ....................................................................................................................... 30 6.4 Q4 2018-Q2 2019: US Preparations ..................................................................................................... 30 6.5 Q3 2019: US Launch ............................................................................................................................... 31 6.6 Q4 2019: Going after hyper-decentralization ..................................................................................... 31 6.7 Beyond Q4 2019: Rolling out to other deregulated power markets ................................................ 31
7 Team ...................................................................................................................................... 32 7.1 Core team .................................................................................................................................................. 32 7.2 Senior advisors ......................................................................................................................................... 33
8 Indicative proceeds of token sale ........................................................................................... 35 8.1 Licensing & legal ...................................................................................................................................... 35 8.2 Technological integration ....................................................................................................................... 36 8.3 Operations & administration ................................................................................................................. 36 8.4 Marketing .................................................................................................................................................. 36
References ...................................................................................................................................... 37
4
ABSTRACT
Irene Energy is a green electricity supplier that uses the Stellar Blockchain and artificial intelligence to
bring radical transparency, verifiable traceability, flexibility and efficiency to the electricity supplier
industry. Together, these properties allow novel value propositions, for both consumers and producers.
Irene Energy’s token, Tellus, is the world’s first clean and green token.
Consumers: Irene acts as a personal energy supplier that allows consumers to individually select which
producers they wish to buy their electricity from (independent producers, local businesses, neighbours,
…). The selection process is gamified (swiping right and left). Artificial Intelligence ensures that this
selection drives the customer’s actual purchases, every 15min, as closely as possible. Blockchain-enabled
traceability ensures that past purchases are verifiable. As such, Irene gives back to consumers absolute
control over their electricity spending – while tech-enabled efficiency also allows to offer them cheaper
fares.
Producers: transparency means that participating in the fight against global warming is no longer an
anonymous activity. With Irene, a company (for example installing photovoltaic panels on its roofs) lets
its local community know when they consume its electricity – instead of anonymously selling its excess
electricity back to the grid. Irene allows producers to monetize their excess production, with the unique
additional upside of showcasing their wider activities and building their local corporate reputation.
Irene’s backbone is the Stellar blockchain. Blockchain-based back-office operations enable Irene (i) to settle
transactions every 15min – introducing flexibility and guaranteeing precise origins to consumers, (ii) to
make these cash-flows public (yet pseudo-anonymous) – introducing verifiability and transparency, and
(iii) to be lean and efficient – lowering costs to final users. Stellar was chosen for its scalability, its
transaction speed, its low transaction costs and its energy efficiency.
Artificial Intelligence and the latest breakthroughs in signal processing allow Irene to manage, schedule
and dispatch 2-way electricity flows and to forecast actual consumptions and productions.
Tellus are Irene’s exchange tokens and the world’s first clean and green tokens. Tellus are necessary to
participate to the platform – where they settle their market-value-equivalent in Irene bills: meaning where
they allow one to pay for green electricity. They are based on the eco-friendly and socially-responsible
Stellar blockchain. And purchasing Tellus will always be subject to having passed KYC/AML
questionnaires.
Overall, Irene’s business model seeks to mimic the one that enabled Airbnb to disrupt the hotel industry:
building a demand portfolio (of savvy, price-sensitive and eco-aware consumers “poached” from main-
stream suppliers) and a decentralized, capex-free supply portfolio (power generation attracted by her
marketing and local corporate image value propositions).
Irene plans on launching in Europe in late 2018 and in the US in early 2019.
5
1 MARKET CONTEXT
1.1 A RISING SENSE OF URGENCY ON GLOBAL WARMING The reality of global warming has been increasingly apparent in all parts of the world. A record hurricane
season, fuelled by abnormally warm waters in the Atlantic, has caused billions of dollars in damages and
killed dozens. Europe and the US are now suffering repeated heat waves every summer. The list of how
global warming is impacting the life of many of us is growing and is inexorably becoming more tangible
and frightening.
The sense of urgency is rising – especially in the US where public concern is quickly increasing and has
reached a three-decade high (1) in March 2017. Other countries, such as Germany, have led the way for
quite some time.
1.2 INCREASING CUSTOMER ENGAGEMENT AND AWARENESS Most of us agree that something has to be done and if we were given a free, transparent and easy option
to act, a large majority of us would gladly take it. But because switching to all-green suppliers wasn’t a
possibility not so long ago, the rate at which consumers are switching is still relatively slow. It is however
accelerating (2). In the UK, traditional suppliers have lost 15% market share to new entrants since 2012
(3). In France, the main incumbent is losing 100k customers a month (4).
On the generation side, getting day-to-day, normal businesses to participate in eco-supportive programs is
still a challenge for governments and regulators alike. (5)
The Irene project believes that 3 barriers are standing in the way of mass-adoption of green energy
behaviours:
(i) switching or acting is still perceived as a relative hassle,
(ii) the economic incentive is not high enough to justify going through this hassle,
(iii) any positive non-financial impact lack transparency and tangibility.
These are however strong barriers only to the extent that they are holding together.
A perceived hassle
Consumers are generally put off by the complexity of switching providers. It can involve paperwork.
Some suppliers require access to your home to install a smart device of their own. Worse, they may want
to control it.
For local businesses, installing photovoltaic (PV) panels, participating in Demand Side Response (DSR)
programs is an unappealing diversion from their day-to-day activity. Who to contact, how does it work,
what does it entail?
Prices
Paying more for greener electricity while your neighbour isn’t, is a hard sale. And if a green electricity
supplier turns out to be cheaper (not because he is green but because he is leaner), the financial benefit is
rarely substantial.
For a local business, does the marginal bill reduction/additional revenue stream really justify the time, risk
and investment?
Lack of transparency
The power supply business is mysterious. For consumers, it leads to mistrust: how do I really know that
my electricity is green? After all, electrons don’t go around with a tag on their backs that says “We are
6
green!” (They don’t but you can know whether your money goes to green producers or not.) Even if you
accept that you are paying for green electricity, it remains abstract. What is really your impact? Coal-fired
plants are still in business.
For producers, assuming you install PV panels or participate in DSR programs, who will know about it?
Nobody. Your community will not know when and if they are consuming your production. You’re doing
something good, that’s great. But nobody knows and therefore cares.
1.3 A TWIN REVOLUTION
Renewable energies: from subsidized to the cheapest
Renewable energies have been and still are heavily subsidized. In 2015, those subsidies globally stood at
no less than USD135bn (6). These subsidies have enabled large-scale investments, which, in turn, have
dramatically reduced installation costs. Solar costs have on average decreased by 69% since 2009 and the
trend is set to continue, nearly unchanged – with a further 43% drop by 2025.
By then, solar energy generation could be cheaper than coal (7), traditionally the cheapest, albeit dirtiest,
form of electricity production.
From centralized to decentralized
Generating power used to require billion-dollar up-front investments: this is how much a large power
plant costs (whether oil-fired, coal-fired or nuclear). Only large, often state-sponsored, operators used to
have the means to enter such a market.
Distributed energy resources (DER) are dramatically altering this landscape. Between 2010 and 2015, the global market for DER grew at double-digit rates, reaching USD130bn in 2015 (8) and the rate is expected to accelerate – especially considering the rise of Electric Vehicles.
0
1000
2000
3000
4000
5000
6000
2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2025
USD
per
kW
h
Evolution of solar farm costs
Source: Bloomberg
-69%
-43%
Those are the 3 points that Irene seeks to jointly address, by introducing transparency, flexibility,
traceability and increased efficiency
7
DERs include photovoltaic panels (PV), batteries, microgrids, embedded networks, microCHPs, demand side response (DSR)… Individually, their installation cost is extremely low. Together they are the power of tomorrow.
1.4 A $130BN MARKET UNDER SIEGE If life used to be easy for large, near monopolistic power companies, they are now trapped by the high
costs of their aging production assets and by plethoric workforces (9) – leaving them particularly ill-
equipped to face the twin revolution described earlier.
Size of the market
In 2015, the revenues from the sale of electricity to end customers reached USD341bn in the United
States alone (USD177bn to Residential customers and USD144bn to Commercials customers) (10).
Roughly 15% of this electricity came from renewable sources. This share is forecasted to reach 28% by
2030 (11).
The EU has a target to reach a share of 20% of renewable energies by 2020 (12). As of 2017, eleven
countries have already reached this target. And in 2016, 90% of the new power generation capacity
installed in Europe were renewable sources. (13)
By 2020, the renewable share of the power market in the US, Germany, France and the UK alone will
reach a combined USD130bn per year.
How exactly is this market under siege?
1.4.1.1 Who will contract the new (decentralized) production capacity? With incumbents left with large amounts of long-term debts on their balance-sheets, the race to contract
the new, rapidly-growing and highly-distributed generation capacity is wide open. This time around,
incumbents have however no competitive advantage.
1.4.1.2 Who will capture the increasingly sensitive consumer base? Plagued by expensive to run (and to fuel) power plants and by costly workforces, incumbent utilities
struggle to lower their prices.
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
US UK Germany France
Bill
ion
s o
f U
SD
Renewable market projections 2016-2030
2016 2020 2030
8
1.4.1.3 Who will be able to handle the system’s exponential complexity?
Running large power plants used to be about the so-called merit-order: turning on and off the right
plants, depending on the fluctuations of fuel prices and of an unpredictable consumption. But DERs
have no marginal costs (solar energy, wind energy, …). Running a DER-based production portfolio is
now about being able to handle an exponentially-increasing number of 2-way transactions between 2
intricated and overlapping networks: small producers and consumers.
The new game in town is fast, efficient, agile and low-cost settlement operations, backed by improved and
intelligent scheduling operations.
1.5 BLOCKCHAIN, A TIMELY SOLUTION
What is blockchain and what does it do?
Blockchain is an emerging technology that is gaining considerable traction. In a sense, blockchain is the
3rd evolution of keeping a ledger up-to-date. Back in the days, an accountant (let’s call him Rupert) was
responsible for manually writing down in a book (or ledger) every transaction that took place in his
entrusted market. Computers considerably facilitated Rupert’s job and his book became a digital file in a
(or several) computer(s). Blockchain now enables Rupert to retire altogether: his ledger is not his any
longer, it is actually not held by anyone anywhere any longer: it is now fully decentralized, held and
automatically updated in a decentralized computer – or virtual machine, such as Ethereum’s (14), (15).
Retiring the Ruperts of this world – or, as it is most commonly presented: “cutting the middlemen” –
allows for fast, efficient and lean settlement operations (16). Decentralization also allows for enhanced
security.
Blockchain and the energy industry
Numerous energy applications of blockchain are reportedly being currently tested. Among the looked-
into applications, the most frequently cited are (17), (18):
(i) Utility Billing
(ii) Certificates of Origin
(iii) Peer-to-peer (P2P) Trading
(iv) Wholesale Trading
(v) Electric Vehicle Charging and Sharing
(vi) Demand Response
Among the above 6 applications, a lot of attention goes into P2P trading and wholesale trading (17) –
because, if successful, they would bring the most ground-breaking disruptions.
Irene’s down-to-earth approach to blockchain
The Irene team however believes that the biggest value of blockchain is “simply” in improving settlement
operations by:
− reducing costs (by enabling intermediary-free transactions),
− allowing efficient guarantee of origin (by keeping a highly granular ledger of all financial flows),
− introducing flexibility (by allowing near real-time settlements of any money due) and
− introducing cash-flow transparency (by using a public ledger – where consumers know that, shall
they wish to, they can check where their electricity spending truly went)
At the same time, our experience in commodity trading convinced us that attempting to create improved
power markets/trading platforms would be ambitious. It would require an enormous time and money
investment and gaining traction would be challenging. The commodity trading industry is generally
9
conservative: gold is still traded to this day using a mechanism dating back to… September 1912 (19).
Not to mention the regulatory and administrative hurdles (different feed-in tariffs, subsidies, …).
That is why Irene is not a trading platform (there is no price discovery on Irene) nor is she a marketplace
where there would be bi-party, decentralized price negotiations between producers and consumers.
1.6 STELLAR: THE RIGHT BLOCKCHAIN FOR IRENE ENERGY Irene’s environmental mission statement, what she uses blockchain for and her focus on transparency all
contributed to making the Stellar Network the natural choice for Irene Energy.
Environment
Irene Energy’s mission is to contribute to the fight against global warming by encouraging both the
development of a distributed, local and green production capacity and the endorsement of green
producers by consumers. The environmental issues revolving around the Ethereum or Bitcoin
blockchains would have made using them inconsistent with this very mission. The Stellar Network offers
the ideal solution in that respect.
Scalability
Irene Energy uses blockchain to settle in a cheap, fast, transparent and verifiable way transactions
between its participating producers and consumers: this is exactly what the Stellar Network excels at –
with speed and cost performances significantly superior to the ones of its competitors.
Transparency and AML
Irene Energy will fully leverage Stellar’s built-in token-customization functionality and will make Irene’s
tokens only accessible to buyers meeting AML requirements (not only during but also after the initial token
sale).
Other reasons: security and tradability
Stellar built-in distributed exchange (DEX) offers 2 additional compelling advantages:
− Selling tailored tokens on Stellar is significantly more secure than on other platforms: it simply
consists in placing sell orders on the DEX.
− The DEX allows to list any Stellar-issued tokens on day-1, avoiding to rely on 3rd party
exchanges.
Irene is an electricity supplier. She buys their electricity to producers (at market prices or at the
subsidised price they are entitled to) and sells it back to consumers at Irene’s retail tariff).
Behind the scene, blockchain-backed back-office operations allow to unlock game-changing value
propositions for both consumers and producers. But Irene doesn’t over-complicate it her utilisation
of blockchain.
10
2 IRENE’S VALUE PROPOSITION AND BUSINESS MODEL
2.1 IRENE, A PERSONAL ENERGY SUPPLIER Irene is a fully transparent, blockchain-backed and A.I.-based electricity supplier that (i) lets consumers
individually choose the producers they wish to buy their electricity from, (ii) optimizes real-time purchases
according to this selection and (iii) enables producers to monetize their excess capacity and to showcase
their businesses – very much the same way Airbnb enables hosts to monetize their excess housing
capacity by showcasing their homes.
On Irene, participants can easily alternate between being consumers (when, for example, their PV panel
underproduces) and producers for their own community (when it overproduces) – again, very much like
Airbnb. The end objective is for Irene to allow her customers to monetize any electric asset they may
possess – such as Electric Vehicle (EVs).
Consumers choose their producers
With Irene, registered consumers swipe through participating producers and build their own bundle of
producers, one choice at a time. Once a bundle is selected, it stays active for as long as it is not changed.
Changes can be made anytime and happen in near real time.
Final fares do not depend on the chosen producers.
Irene makes sure, thanks to her A.I.-based production forecast algorithms and scheduling operations, that
this selection drives actual purchases and dispatching as closely as possible.
Producers advertise their production of green electricity
With Irene, participating producers have a profile explaining who they are, how their electricity is
produced and what is their production capacity.
Producers can be one of 3 types:
(i) independent energy producers,
(ii) local non-energy companies with excess power capacity, or
(iii) individuals
Possible types of participation include solar energy (PV plant, PV panels on the roof of a house or of a
factory), wind energy (wind farm, single wind turbine in landowner’s property), micro-hydro units,
biomass units, batteries or participating in DSR schemes (where a business or an individual is
incentivised to reduce consumption when electricity is scarce). At a later stage, Irene will also enable
participants to monetize their EVs or home batteries (such as Tesla’s PowerWall).
Participation is easy: it only requires to sign-up and to have a smart meter.
Participation is guaranteed: Irene guarantees the purchase of all the production of a participating
producer and will simply sell the electricity that is not consumed by participating consumers back to the
grid at wholesale price (i.e. for no loss or profit).
Stellar and the TELLUS token: Irene’s blockchain backbone
Behind-the-scene, the Stellar blockchain is what makes Irene’s value propositions possible. Stellar enables
efficient, cheap and near-real time settlement of even the smallest transactions – which, in turn, enables:
(i) to precisely monitor all electricity flows: guaranteeing to consumers the origin of their electricity
and to producers, its destination,
11
(ii) to select producers and swap them in near real time (which is not possible if bills are settled every
month or 3 months as they often are today),
(iii) to offer lower electricity fares to end-users thanks to extra lean back-office operations
2.2 IRENE’S VALUE PROPOSITION TO CONSUMERS
Empowering consumers
Irene believes that introducing maximum transparency, building maximum trust and
transferring maximum power to consumers is the best way to engage them. Maximum
transparency means that they can choose exactly who they buy their electricity from:
collectively, they take back the control over the energy policy of their
community/city/region/country.
If a consumer doesn’t like, say, the visual impact or the noise pollution that wind turbines
cause in its community, he can make sure none of his electricity spending will go to them.
On the other hand, if he likes a story or company (for their corporate image, for their impact on his
community or simply for their core products), he can actively support their green energy initiative.
The Stellar blockchain being public, all transactions are verifable. Knowing their public key, consumers
can double-check that their selection was indeed listened to. They can pick any day and time and verify –
shall they wish to – who their money went to (the owners of the producing addresses will on the other
hand be made public).
While at the same time offering cheaper prices
Irene expects to be 10% to 20% cheaper than the average competition and to be in line with
the cheapest offers out there.
How is it possible?
In most markets, the cost of the actual commodity (electricity) only accounts for around 1/3
of an average end-consumer’s electricity bill.
In New York State, for example, the monthly average retail price of electricity roughly fluctuates between
17cts/kWh and 20cts/kWh (20). At the same time, wholesale prices typically fluctuate between
USD25/MWh and USD 50/MWh (21) and averaged USD34.28/MWh in 2016 – or 3.428cts/kWh... the
lowest in the history of the NYISO (22).
The situation is similar in the UK, where wholesale costs only represent 38% of an average energy bill
(23). As shown by the UK regulator, the rest is made of network costs (26%), environmental obligations
(8%), operating costs (17%), VAT (5%) and profits (5%).
By considerably reducing operating costs thanks to her efficient and ultra-lean blockchain backbone, by
delegating capex to producers, by favouring a local, community-based consumption pattern and by
extensively using A.I. to manage her wholesaling operations, we estimate that Irene could slash operating
costs by about half.
Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity
Simplicity is key. Irene will offer a customer experience as seamless and frictionless as
possible. This means:
(i) no third-party device to install upon joining (all you need is a standard smart meter)
(ii) Irene takes care of all administrative switching-related paperwork
(iii) no bill pre-payment (unless it is customary in the target market)
12
(iv) on Irene’s website, everything is in one place: your consumption, your bills, your carbon
footprint, the origin of your electricity and much more
(v) consumers and producers will not hear of blockchain unless they want to
Finally, for those consumers only attracted to her by her cheaper prices, Irene offers pre-designed
bundles of local and green electricity.
Absolute flexibility & gamification
Thanks to the Stellar blockchain and to her internal, intermediary-less, token-based payment
system, Irene settles her customers’ bills every 15 minutes. This, in turns, allows Irene’s
consumers to switch between producers with near immediate effect.
The Irene website and app is thus designed to allow consumers to swipe right and left while
they go through the list of participating producers – in the process adding and removing
producers to and from their portfolio of chosen producers.
On top of this ludic “Tinder-like” feature, consumers will enjoy total flexibility with regards to their
participation to Irene: near real-time settlement means they can leave the platform whenever they want.
2.3 IRENE’S VALUE PROPOSITION TO PRODUCERS
For small producers: a new way of doing local advertising
Because she introduces 100% transparency, Irene’s message to (non-energy specialist)
producers is simple: what better way to promote your business in the neighbourhood?
With Irene, installing some PV panels or participating to DSR programs is no longer only
about a few thousand dollars of savings. It is also about locally promoting your core activity.
For these producers, the upside of joining Irene is the potential to leverage this new channel
of advertising and thereby reaching out to their core customer base. While there is virtually no downside,
as Irene pays them for their MWhs strictly the same price as any other aggregator would.
(i) 100% transparency means that with Irene, the entire community will know which companies /
individuals are contributing to the fight against global warming. Today, a company or individual’s
action does go completely unnoticed in its own community, since excess electricity is
anonymously sold back to the grid
(ii) 100% transparency means that, when on Irene, users will be able to click on a contributing
company’s profile learn about them and their activities and find a link to their commercial
website,
(iii) 100% transparency finally means that, just as consumers know that they are buying their
electricity from a company, this same company knows who they are selling to. They will have a
list of their electricity clients and will be allowed to reach out to them on an occasional basis.
Examples of potentially interested parties:
− non-energy specialist: a local service company that has PV panels installed on its roof (garage,
supermarket, local factory…), a co-working space participating in DSR (demand side response)
programs, a farmer that has a wind turbine on his land
− larger corporates, conscious of their impact on the community that welcomed their data centre,
offices or plant and who have developed some in-house green generation capacity – which excess
production is currently sold back to the grid
13
At a later stage, Irene will look into monetizing the local-advertising dimension of her service offering: for
instance, by offering complementary initial advertising campaign to one’s client base and later charging
for additional campaigns.
For larger producers: real-time settlement
For larger and specialized energy producers, a positive corporate image is important too. But
most likely less so that for non-energy specialists. For them, Irene’s value proposition is the
possibility of getting paid in near-real time – instead of on a monthly-basis in some
jurisdictions – hence considerably reducing their working capital requirements and incurred
credit risks.
2.4 IRENE’S BUSINESS MODEL Irene is an electricity supplier. She doesn’t intend to re-invent power markets but to disrupt the electricity
supply industry.
Irene buys her electricity from producers at official market prices – or at subsidised prices when
producers are entitled to subsidies (in which case Irene will receive back the difference from the
subsidizing authorities).
Irene then sells back her electricity to her consumer base at a contracted retail price (that will be aligned
with the cheapest prices out there).
Part of the difference between retail and wholesale prices will be Irene’s profits (the rest being paid to
authorities as taxes, levies to use the distribution network, …). Irene’s margins will be boosted by her
ultra-lean, blockchain-based operations and by the fact that she has delegated all capex to producers.
It is important to note that when contracted producers overproduce, the excess electricity is simply sold
back to the wholesale market at no profit or loss. In the event where they don’t produce enough, Irene
buys the shortage on the wholesale market and supplies it for the same profit. Consumers are however
made aware of this in their “origin of your electricity” statement.
14
2.5 DATA ACCESS AND DATA PROTECTION Data control and utilisation is increasingly becoming a highly sensitive issue. In Europe, the General Data
Protection Regulation (GDPR) was adopted on 27 April 2016 and will become enforceable from 25 May
2018. (24) And because accessing consumers and producers’ data is key to Irene Energy’s value
propositions, this is a major area of interest for the Irene project.
As a reminder, at Irene Energy, we are using the blockchain technology to introduce transparency in the
electricity supply chain by means of traceable and intermediary-less micro-payments. But we also believe
that data protection and utilisation is a very promising user-case of blockchain. Not being our core focus
nor core expertise, we have therefore started looking into partnerships to add a second – totally separated
– layer of blockchain around these data issues into our final value proposition the end clients.
15
3 IRENE’S ACHIEVEMENTS
Irene is a high-tech platform. She relies on blockchain for her back-office operations but her other
technological disruption is her extensive use of the latest break-throughs in machine learning, deep
learning and signal processing techniques to handle her power trading and dispatching activities.
Together, a series of A.I. models allow Irene (i) to optimally allocate the actual production of her
participating producers to the right consumers (depending on their pre-selection of producers), (ii) to
purchase in advance the missing electricity from the grid (if need be) and (iii) sell the excess electricity
back to the grid (if need be).
3.1 CLIENT PLATFORM Please visit us at www.irene.energy
Please note that the platform is still being developed and the above website is work in progress. Notably,
design, UI and UX are work in progress.
3.2 BACK-OFFICE Algorithms are in place for consumers not to choose too un-balanced portfolios (such as a “all-PV”
selection).
Additionally, the back-office (Python) algorithms are in place and follow the following logic:
1. Upon joining, consumers and producers are allocated online individual blockchain addresses
internal to Irene – which belong to Irene
2. They top-up their internal-to-Irene blockchain wallet (or are lent 1-month-worth of Tellus if they
have just joined)
3. Consumers swipe through participating producers and build their own portfolio of producers
4. The exact consumption and production from participants is then recorded by smart meters with
a 15 (or 30min) data granularity
5. Every 15 (or 30min), the algorithm allocates consumption and production (from step 4)
according to consumers’ portfolio selections (from step 3)
6. TELLUS transactions are triggered between the internal-to-Irene blockchain addresses (from
step 1) to settle all transactions (from step 4) that occurred during a given period according to the
allocation (from step 5)
7. Back to step 4 for the next period
16
8. At any time, consumers can go back to step 3 and modify their portfolio with near real-time
effect (i.e end of current period) – as their bills are settled at the end of every period.
Notes:
− The frequency (15 or 30min) is the international standard for Supervisory control and data
acquisition (SCADA) protocols for electrical systems
− Blockchain wallets can’t go negative, hence step 2 where consumers either borrow Tellus from
Irene or must prepay their bills in EUR, GBP or USD (fiat currency then converted into Tellus)
– see paragraph 4.3
Illustration:
3.3 MACHINE LEARNING-BASED PRODUCTION FORECASTING In most deregulated power markets, marketing the electricity of producers (meaning selling it on the
wholesale market or directly to end-consumers) requires to forecast on their behalf how much electricity
they are going to produce 24h ahead all the way down to 1-2h before delivery. In most jurisdictions (NY,
Texas, Germany, France, …), producers will get penalized by grid operators for delivering more or less
than announced. On top of this, Irene simply needs to buy the electricity that she is missing and sell the
one she has excess of.
Due to their intermittent nature, short-term forecasting of wind and solar energy is however highly
complex and is actually a prime example of how big data and machine learning revolutions can be
leveraged (25).
Following and improving state-of-the-art research, Irene uses the latest big data, machine learning and
signal-processing techniques to forecast her contracted electricity production.
Wind forecasting
Irene has an up-and-running wind power forecasting tool. From a technical point of view, her model
combines support vector regression classifiers (SVR) with a state-of-the-art signal processing technique
called Wavelet Transform (WT). Unlike Fourier Transform (which forgo all time information for
frequency information), wavelet transform lets you keep a little bit of both: time and frequency
17
information (26) – in virtue of the uncertainty principle. Their mathematical development really
(re)started in 1984 with the work of Grossman and Morlet (27).
Uncertainty principle:
∆𝑡 ∙ ∆𝜔 ≥ 12⁄
Wavelet transform general form:
𝑋(𝑎, 𝑏) = 1
√𝑎 ∫ Ψ (
𝑡 − 𝑏
𝑎) 𝑥(𝑡)𝑑𝑡
∞
−∞
With 𝑡 the time, 𝜔 the frequency, Ψ the chosen wavelet and 𝑎 and 𝑏 scaling factors
Irene’s model decomposes wind power production signals into wavelets and then fits and predicts each
wavelet individually. This general approach has been attracting very recent and significant attention in the
academic world as shown by (28), (29), (30) or (31) – among others.
Tested on data provided by the US National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NERL) and by several
independent energy producers (in France and in the UK), our results reach 87% accuracy up to 3hours
ahead.
Note that Irene uses TensorFlow, Google’s open-source library (32).
This is to be compared to national forecasts which are typically only 70% accurate one-day ahead (33),
(34), (35) despite benefiting from very large, nation-wide diversification effects.
Solar forecasting
Irene also has an up-and-running solar power forecasting model. From a technical point of view, this
model combines deep learning classifiers (Artificial Neural Network) with, again, wavelet transform and
what is called a spatiotemporal approach (an approach where – instead of using expensive satellite or
ground imagery – the interdependency between grounds sensors is leveraged to improve forecasts).
This technique has also been attracting very recent and significant attention in the academic world as
shown by (36), (37) or (38) – among others.
MWh
hours
Actual Irene’s prediction
18
Tested on data provided by the US National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NERL), our results here are
impressive too: 84% accuracy up to 3hours ahead. This is a 25% error reduction compared to 4-hours
ahead GFS-based forecasts and 30% compared to 24hours ahead GFS-based forecasts.
3.4 COMMERCIAL ACHIEVEMENTS AND PARTNERSHIPS Irene started to engage with future potential clients in Q4 2017.
On the production side, a first producer has been secured in France – with an independent French
electricity producer currently operating around 120MW of wind capacity and with another 50MW in
development.
On the consumption side, a partnership has also been secured to become the default electricity supplier
of a company specializing in connecting and managing smart buildings and micro-grids. Preliminary talks
are being held with large residential property managers and some French municipalities.
Distribution partnerships are also under discussion with sale channels in Europe and in the US.
Actual Irene’s prediction
MWh
hours
19
4 TOKEN TECHNICAL OVERVIEW
4.1 INTRODUCING THE TELLUS COINS: THE WORLD’S FIRST CLEAN AND
GREEN TOKEN The Tellus coins are tokens built on the Stellar blockchain. The Tellus coins are Irene’s internal payment
and transaction method – which means that behind the scene, Irene’s active producers and consumers
will always be exchanging Tellus back and forth.
A green token:
− The Stellar blockchain is at the time of writing this white paper one of the most energy efficient
and socially-responsible blockchain in production (39)
− On Irene, the Tellus coins will be redeemable as payment of a green electricity bill
A clean token:
− The Stellar blockchain gives to token issuer the ability (i) to restrict who can buy its token to
purchaser that have successfully passed KYC/AML questionnaire and (ii) to freeze accounts
identified as being linked to terrorist or criminal activities
− Irene Energy has pro-actively decided to implement these features when creating the Tellus coins
− Meaning that purchasing Tellus will (during the token sale but also after) be restricted to having
successfully passed KYC/AML tests
Together, these properties make the Tellus the world’s first clean and green tokens.
Details about how the Tellus coins will be used
It is important to note that Irene is not a parallel power market and doesn’t intend to re-invent power
markets or to substitute herself to current power markets. On Irene:
(i) producers are paid for their electricity the normal price of electricity on their local market at the
time of delivery (or when it applies, are paid the subsidised price that they are contractually
entitled to) in their local currency, and
(ii) consumers pay the retail prices that they signed-up for when joining Irene – in their local
currency. This price includes the price of the underlying commodity that they consume
(electricity) but also, and depending on their local jurisdiction, any taxes, charges or fees related
to the use of the distribution and transmission networks
Irene is an intermediary and the Tellus coins are the internal payment method that Irene uses. Irene is
the one holding the Tellus/national currency fx risk.
At the end of every month or of every 2 weeks, Irene’s producers will be paid for their produced
electricity what they are due in their national currencies – unless they specifically ask to keep part or all
their proceeds in Tellus: at which point they start having a Tellus exposure.
Likewise, Irene’s consumers will by default pay their bills in their national currencies – but will also have
the option to pay them directly in Tellus: at which point they will stop having a Tellus exposure on those
Tellus.
Redemption
Regardless of when or where they were bought (during the Pre-Sale, during the Main Sale, on a token
exchange or directly on Irene’s platform) and for as long as Irene is operating, 1 Tellus will settle its
market value of Irene bills. Irene bills are expected to primarily relate to energy supply services. However,
at a later stage, they will also relate to advertising services for local producers (see paragraph 2.3.1).
20
1 Tellus (TLS) will settle its market value of Irene bills: it means that if 1 TLS is trading at EUR 10, 1 TLS
will pay EUR 10 of bills contracted on Irene.
It is also important to note that, shall 1 TLS be worth more than a standard bill, consumers will be able to
pay in “cents” of Tellus.
Illustrations
Let’s assume Sienna buys her electricity from Will. The Tellus flow between Sienna and Will is as follow:
a. Case where Sienna uses Irene as a standard electricity supplier (she buys her Tellus by paying her
bills in her national currency):
Note that the settlement of the Tellus flows between Will and Sienna happens every 15min (which is the
international norm used by smart meters).
b. Case where Sienna buys her Tellus on a token exchange and intends to settle her Irene bills with
them:
21
AML compliance
The Tellus coins will fully leveraged the option available on the Stellar blockchain to customize tokens so
they can meet AML compliance regulation.
Holding Tellus outside of Irene’s internal wallets will be restricted to buyers that satisfy AML compliance
regulations (Irene’s internal wallets are the ones that Irene allocates to consumers and producers upon
joining – and where their bill payments in fiat currencies are converted in Tellus).
A Stellar address that has not been approved will not be able to hold and/or purchase Tellus (even out of
the secondary market).
During the Token Sale Events, this KYC/AML questionnaire will take place on the sale’s landing
website.
After the Token Sale Events, it will take place on www.irene.energy
The questionnaire will be outsourced to a specialized 3rd party supplier.
4.2 SUPPLY OF TELLUS Tellus (TLS) are Stellar ICO tokens. They will be issued by Irene’s issuing Stellar account. This account
will be locked before the start of the Pre-Sale, ensuring that no further Tellus tokens can ever be created
again.
The account-locking mechanism will be standard to Stellar: setting the weight of the token creator to 0.
(40)
The base Tellus supply will be 500,000,000 Tellus.
250,000,000 additional Tellus will be created before the Pre-sale to cover the needs of the event.
Out of these 250,000,000, any Tellus that will not have been sold during the Pre-sale will be destroyed.
The final Tellus supply is therefore: 500,000,000 + number of Tellus sold during the Pre-sale.
22
4.3 DEMAND FOR TELLUS
A demand rising with Irene’s popularity
The more participants will be using Irene, the higher the demand for Tellus. Demand for Tellus will be
driven by 3 factors:
(i) consumers buying and holding Tellus to pay their electricity bills
(ii) producers receiving Tellus and cash-settling them at most on a weekly basis
(iii) investors holding Tellus as an investment
Note that in countries where pre-paying is not the market norm, Irene will not make her customers pre-
pay for their bills – to avoid reducing her attractiveness. In those countries, Irene will in effect lend one-
month worth of electricity in Tellus to her customers – as blockchain wallets cannot send tokens they
don’t hold.
Illustrations
Assuming that:
1. Each new consumer pays his bill every month
2. Each new consumer consumes USD 100 of electricity every month (New York State average
(41))
3. Wholesale prices are 1/3 retail prices
4. A producer cash-settles his Tellus every 2 weeks
5. One Tellus is worth EUR 0.10 and EUR 1 = USD 1.15
What happens when consumer Tom joins?
1. Irene tops up Tom’s account with one month-worth of Tom’s consumption – or 870 Tellus in
this example (=100/0.10/1.15). Alternatively, Tom prepays the same amount by buying 870
Tellus either from Irene or from the market
2. Then Tom starts consuming electricity and starts spending his Tellus, as he consumes and on a
15min basis
23
3. Tom’s Tellus go partly back to Irene and partly to producers such as Will (mentioned in the
former example)
4. Will builds up his own Tellus position, immobilizing in turn Tom’s original Tellus
5. After 2 weeks, Will decides to cash-settle and sells his Tellus back to the market or to Irene
6. After 30 days, Tom tops up his account again and immobilizes 870 Tellus fully again
Conclusion: In the above illustration, each new individual joining Irene increases the demand for Tellus by
roughly 500 Tellus.
What happen when producer WindCo joins?
WindCo is a small wind farm with 10MW of installed capacity. Its capacity factor (% of the time when the
wind blows) is 33%. WindCo sells its production to local businesses and households – which are also on
Irene.
1. In 2 weeks, WindCo builds up a 318,000 Tellus position (10MW*24h*7d*2w*0.33 = 1,108 MWh
produced, sold for USD 33 with 1 TLS = EUR 0.10 = USD 0.115 => 1,108*33/0.115 = 318,000
Tellus of sales)
2. After 2 weeks, WindCo cash-settles its position
3. WindCo starts building up its Tellus position again by generating more electricity
4. Assuming a steady build-up, an average of 159,000 Tellus immobilized at any point in time
5. On the consumption side, WindCo’s consumers immobilize 3x2=6 times more Tellus (they pay 3
times the price and need to build up 4 weeks of Tellus instead of 2 weeks) or 954,000 Tellus.
Conclusion: In the above illustration, for each additional 10MW of wind production capacity that joins
Irene, the demand for Tellus roughly increases by 1,113,000 Tellus.
4.4 THE TELLUS PRE-SALE
Technical overview
As a reminder, 500,000,000 Tellus tokens will be created before the start of the Pre-Sale and will be sent
to Irene’s accounts.
On average over
time,
500 Tellus are
immobilized by Tom
24
An additional 250,000,000 Tellus will be created to cover the Pre-Sale: these Tellus will be the ones sold
during the Pre-sale and out of these 250,000,000 Tellus, the ones that will not be sold will be destroyed at
the end of the Pre-sale.
The Pre-Sale will leverage Stellar’s built-in distributed exchange. The Tellus Pre-sale (and the subsequent
Sales) will simply consist of Tellus sell orders placed by Irene Energy on the distributed exchange.
This offers superior security (no hacking of crowdsale address) and superior flexibility and transparency in
terms of price setting.
Soft-cap and target: 5,000,000 Tellus
Hard-cap: 250,000,000 Tellus
Date and duration: The Pre-sale will start on March 12th, 2018 at 2pm GMT. It will last for 8 weeks and
end on May 6th, 2018.
Price: For the Pre-sale, the price of one Tellus is set at EUR 0.08.
The price will be adjusted daily (at 2pm London time) to reflect the prevailing XLM/EUR exchange rate
and to protect both Tellus buyers and Irene Energy against excessive XLM volatility.
Escrow: During the Pre-Sale, if less than 5,000,000 Tellus are not sold, the buyers’ funds will be returned
to Tellus purchasers in their original currency.
Currency: The only currency that will be accepted during the Sales events (Pre-Sale + Main sale) will be
Stellar Lumens (XLM).
Disclosure: During the entire course of the Pre-Sale, Irene Energy will publish daily updates of the funds
that are being collected.
Final Tellus supply: 500,000,000 + number of Tellus sold during the Pre-sale
What buyers get
If or when Irene is successfully deployed and for as long as she operates, holding Tellus will be necessary
to participate in the Irene platform. 1 Tellus will settle its market value equivalent of Irene bills. The bills
can cover electricity supply services or marketing services or a mix of the two.
It is important to note that Tellus are not equity securities: they do not confer any ownership share in Irene.
In particular, 1 Tellus (TLS) doesn’t give:
(i) any future right to receive an interest or share in Irene’s companies and affiliates;
(ii) any future right in Irene’s intellectual property related to Irene;
(iii) any voting right or dividend right; or
(iv) any other form of interest in Irene or its affiliates
Tellus are not debt securities. They don’t give any right of repayment or any right to acquire shares in Irene.
Tellus will be redeemable as payments of future Irene services but under no circumstances can they be
expected to be bought back by Irene in any sort of monetary transaction.
For further information, please refer to the Irene’s Terms and Conditions document available at www.irene-
crowdsale.com.
Risks
Risks are linked with purchasing and holding Tellus. Before participating to either the Pre-sale or the
Main Sale, participants will need to expressly consent to Irene’s Terms and Conditions. Tokens are
suitable only for buyers who fully understand and are willing to assume the risks involved in purchasing
25
Tellus. Participation will be conditional on expressly agreeing on assuming the risks involved in
purchasing Tellus.
Among the risks linked to Tellus are (list non-exhaustive):
− risks of devaluation of the Tellus coin
− risks associated to the development and deployment of Irene
− risks associated to the Stellar ecosystem
− risks associated to the nature of blockchain tokens (loss of key, mining attacks, hacking)
− risks associated to Irene’s market (competition from other platforms, from incumbent utilities,
…)
For further information, please refer to the Irene’s Terms and Conditions document available at
www.irene-crowdsale.com.
Restricted jurisdictions and Sale’s Terms and Conditions
Before participating to either the Pre-Sale or the Main Sale, potential buyers will be required to represent
that they are not operating from jurisdictions where ICOs have been banned – at the time of subscription,
such jurisdictions most notably include the People’s Republic of China.
Irene’s Terms and Conditions for the Tellus sale contain questions relating to these qualifications. Irene
may decline to admit a prospective buyer for any reason or for no reason.
4.5 TELLUS MAIN SALES I AND II Two Main Sale Events will be organized after the Pre-sale. Together they will sell 300,000,000 Tellus out
of the 500,000,000 base Tellus supply.
Main Sale I
The Main Sale I will start on May 7th, 2018 and will last for 6 weeks.
This sale will be capped at 150,000,000 Tellus.
The price will be EUR 0.10 per Tellus.
The proceeds of the Main Sale I are expected to be mainly used to finalize Irene’s technology and to
market the launch of Irene in Europe (Q4 2018).
The Main Sale I will be closed to the US general public.
Main Sale II
Irene Energy doesn’t expect the Main Sale II to start before December 2018. The Main Sale II will last
for 6 weeks.
The sale will seek to sell the remaining Tellus out of the 300,000,000 set aside for these 2 sales.
The sale will only take place upon successful launch in 3 European countries.
The price will be set around what will then be the market price – but no less than EUR 0.10 per
Tellus.
The proceeds of the Main Sale II are expected to be mainly used to market the launch of Irene in the US
(Q2 2019).
The Main Sale II will be open to the US general public (pending the necessary approval from the SEC).
26
4.6 AFTER THE TELLUS PRE-SALE AND SALES
Tellus are tradable tokens
Being tokens issued on Stellar, the Tellus coins will be automatically tradable on the Stellar built-in
distributed exchange – not requiring to be listed on 3rd party exchanges (unlike ECR-20 tokens). The
Tellus coins can however also be listed on any exchanges that accept Stellar Lumens.
After the Main Sale I, the value of the Tellus coins will be set by market forces on the markets where they
will be tradable.
Tellus are necessary to use Irene and they settle Irene bills
Upon successful deployment of Irene, the Tellus coins will be necessary to use the platform. They will
settle their market value in Irene bills.
It means that for as long as Irene is deployed, 1 Tellus will pay for Irene services.
It is however important to note that under no circumstances does it mean that Irene commits to buy back
Tellus for their market value in a monetary transaction. Tellus give rights to use Irene services and are
redeemable on Irene as payment of an Irene service but they don’t confer any right to any cash payment
from Irene.
Use of the created Tellus
The 500,000,000 Tellus base-supply will cover the Main Sales I and II (300,000,000 Tellus), future
working capital requirements (20,000,000 Tellus), a growth and rewards pool (20,000,000 Tellus), a
liquidity pool (30,000,000 Tellus), a current employees and early backers pool (100,000,000 Tellus), a
future employees pool (25,000,000 Tellus) and a Bounty campaign pool (5,000,000 Tellus).
After the Pre-Sale:
Working capital requirements for example include lending 1-month worth of electricity bill to consumers
in countries or states where pre-paying for one’s bill is not customary (500 Tellus per new individual
consumer in the example of paragraph 4.3.2). Over time, this pool will be maintained at a level close to
20,000,000 Tellus (pending the fluctuations linked to the activity of the fund).
Main Sale I150,000,000
Main Sale II150,000,000Working capital
20,000,000
Growth & rewards20,000,000
Liquidity30,000,000
Bounty5,000,000
Current employees100,000,000
Future employees25,000,000
27
The growth pool will be used for future customer rewards. Because Tellus can theoretically see their value
linked to Irene’s popularity, offering Tellus to early joiners and later on to “Irene champions” could help
Irene to decentralize her community-building effort.
The liquidity pool will be used to reduce the occurrence of excessive Tellus price moves. This pool will be
maintained over time at a level close to 30,000,000 Tellus (pending the fluctuations linked to the activity
of the fund).
Current and future employee rewards will be subject to gradual vesting periods of between 24 and 60
months. For current employees, the vesting period will begin at the completion of the Main Sale I.
For an indicative use of the proceeds of the token sale, please refer to chapter 8.
28
5 ROUTE-TO-MARKET
5.1 GEOGRAPHIES Irene will launch first in Europe and then in the United States. In Europe, priority markets are the UK,
France and Germany. In the US, priority markets are California, Texas and the state of New York (where
the power market regulations are currently most supportive of her approach).
We are aiming for the following schedule in terms of obtaining the required licenses to operate (license to
distribute electricity to end-consumers and license to trade electricity on the wholesale market):
− UK & France, Q3 2018
− Germany, Q4 2018
− CA, Texas & NY, Q2 2019 – Q3 2019
5.2 CUSTOMERS
Production first
In every market, we will first build a portfolio of producers (for consumers to later choose from). In an
initial phase, we will simply act as an “aggregator” to them – which entails to help them optimizing their
assets and accessing the wholesale market at no cost.
We will target in priority:
(i) small and independent energy producers
(ii) large international companies, mindful of their global and local Corporate Social Responsibilities
image
We believe that Irene’s value proposition of ensuring to trend-setting companies such as Google (42) or
Amazon (43) that their respective communities know if and when they are buying their green electricity
would fit nicely in their vision.
As of end of Q4 2017, we initiated discussions with small independent producers in the UK and in
France – with one producer already secured (around 50MW of installed capacity).
Consumers: corporates first
On the consumer side, the plan is to target corporate clients first. This is because corporate clients are
more price sensitive, are easier to access in terms of regulation and consume larger quantities of
electricity. Additionally, they are more likely to have significant production capacity of their own – which
they might be interested to monetize on Irene too.
We have identified 2 types of corporates that we will address in priority:
(i) small, local industries positioning their products as high-value, high-quality products and
potentially interested in adding an eco-friendly “produced-with-green-electricity” label to it
(ii) residential property managers
As of Q4 2017, we have opened preliminary talks with several large residential property managers (private
and municipality-run) in the South-East of France (Rhone-Alpes-Auvergne region).
Consumers: emphasizing simplicity
We expect that the key to gaining traction among households will be to offer a customer experience as
seamless as possible. This means:
29
− to stick to a product where all is required from them is a smart meter (no installation of fancy
metering devices),
− to take care for them of all administrative paperwork, and
− to have a stream-lined online user page where everything is in one place (consumption, bills,
earnings, carbon footprint, origin of electricity…).
5.3 ELECTRICITY ROAMING AND HYPER-DECENTRALIZATION Our long-term vision is for Irene to truly become the “Airbnb” of electricity, which entails allowing
customers to monetize any electrical asset that they may possess – in particular, Electric Vehicles, home
batteries and potentially smart thermostats. We call the (coming) impact of these assets the “hyper-
decentralization” of the power generation network.
At first, these segments are however intentionally left out.
This is because monetizing them requires controlling them. The Irene project team has 2 issues with this:
(i) controlling those objects entails providing customers with some smarter controlling devices –
which goes against our foremost priority of giving consumers the seamless customer experience
mentioned above, and
(ii) controlling those objects poses privacy intrusion and data protection concerns.
The economic case isn’t clear yet both from Irene’s point of view (downside of losing customers because
of those 2 issues) and for customers (marginal savings gained in exchange of the intrusion).
However, as soon as Irene establishes a larger customer base and in the jurisdictions where regulatory
issues have been cleared, Irene will be looking into offering this possibility to early-adopters.
In particular, Electric Vehicles could help creating an age of “electricity roaming” – where customers
could be using a single Irene account to contribute the electrical capacity of their cars and consume
electricity to charge their cars where and whenever: not only away from home (for example at the office)
but also internationally.
Electric Vehicles (EV)
Their rise is accelerating, and projections are now for them to account for a third of the global auto fleet
by 2040. By then, they will have displaced around 8 million barrels a day of oil production (or more than
what Saudi Arabia exports today) (44). Some countries are now even planning a pure and simple ban on
petrol and diesel cars: the UK and France, both by 2040 (45), (46).
For their owners and for Irene, electric cars are valuable because they allow time-arbitrages: buying
electricity when it’s cheap and selling it back when prices are higher.
Prices can typically fluctuate by around $40/MWh over the course of a day. The intermittency and
unpredictability of renewable energies contribute to exacerbating those fluctuations. Swings of up to
$1,000/MWh are now more and more frequent in highly penetrated markets (47). Power prices
sometimes even turn negative in those markets. (48)
Home batteries
Just like electric cars, home batteries let you monetize time-arbitrage opportunities.
As an example, a Tesla’s PowerWall 2 has a capacity of 13.5kWh (49). That’s 13.5*40/1,000 *30 =
USD16.2/month of potential earnings.
30
6 TIMELINE AND ROADMAP
6.1 Q1 2018: PRE-SALE The Tellus Pre-sale will start on Monday, 12th of March 2018 and finish on Sunday, 6th of May 2018. The
Tellus coins will be sold during the Pre-Sale at EUR 0.08 per Tellus.
6.2 Q1-Q4 2018: TECHNOLOGICAL CONSOLIDATION & EUROPE
PREPARATIONS
Licenses
The target is to obtain the required licenses to operate in the UK and in France in Q3/Q4 2018 and
starting in Q4 2018 in the rest of Europe.
Technology
The first 3 quarters of 2018 will also be spent consolidating our technology and integrating the different
components of our platform (blockchain back-office engine, production forecasting and consumption
forecasting) and connection to power exchanges and to smart meters.
A complete MVP is expected in early Q2 2018 (meaning before the Main Sale I).
The complete Irene platform is expected to be tested and market ready by the end of Q3 2018.
Finance
The Main Sale I is expected to start on May 7th, 2018 and last for 6 weeks. Up to 150,000,000 Tellus will
be put to sale during the Main Sale at a price of EUR 0.10 per Tellus.
Marketing
The proceeds of the Main Sale I are expected to be primarily used to run the marketing campaign of Irene
in Europe.
6.3 Q4 2018: EUROPE LAUNCH Launch in Europe is expected to happen in Q4 2018. First producers on-boarded in Q4 2018. First
corporate consumers on-boarded end of Q4 2018/beginning of Q1 2019. First households and individual
consumers on-boarded in Q1 2019.
6.4 Q4 2018-Q2 2019: US PREPARATIONS
Licenses
The target is to obtain the required licenses to operate in our pilot State end of Q4 2018/Q1 2019.
Finance
The Main Sale II is expected to start in December, 2018 and last for 6 weeks. The Tellus coins that were
allocated to the Main Sales event but not sold during the Main Sale I (300,000,000 minus the number of
Tellus coins sold during the Main Sale I) will be put to sale during the Main Sale at a price equal or greater
than EUR 0.10 per Tellus.
The Main Sale II will happen after the successful launch of Irene in Europe and after having received all
the necessary approvals from the SEC.
31
Marketing
The proceeds of the Main Sale II are expected to be primarily used to run the marketing campaign of
Irene in the US.
6.5 Q3 2019: US LAUNCH Launch in the US is expected to happen in Q3 2019. First producers on-boarded in Q3 2019. First
corporate consumers on-boarded end of Q3 2019. First households and individual consumers on-
boarded in Q4 2019.
6.6 Q4 2019: GOING AFTER HYPER-DECENTRALIZATION Option offered to early-adopters to monetize their Electric Vehicles, their Home Batteries and their
Smart Thermostats. This will have entailed preparation work throughout the beginning of 2019: including
partnering up with a smart(er) meter/controlling device manufacturer.
6.7 BEYOND Q4 2019: ROLLING OUT TO OTHER DEREGULATED POWER
MARKETS We’ll eventually hope to be addressing every country and jurisdiction where the electricity market is
deregulated. That includes the rest of the European Union, part of the United States, Australia,
Switzerland, Chili and soon countries such as Japan and maybe, one day, The People Republic of China.
32
7 TEAM
7.1 CORE TEAM
Guillaume Marchand – founder
Guillaume founded Irene Energy in February 2017. Guillaume is an expert in commodity
trading and in its digitalization. Prior to Irene, Guillaume worked for 2 years at the Boston
Consulting Group (BCG) where he was a core member of the Commodity Trading and Risk
Management Group. He conducted there several renewable energy projects for leading
European and American utilities. Guillaume also worked for 8 years as a commodity and
power trader for Bank of America in London where he led the Complex Option Trading team.
Guillaume holds Engineering degrees from the Mines de Paris and from l’École Polytechnique, Paris and
a MBA from INSEAD.
Julien Murésianu – A.I. technical lead
Julien co-founded Jalgos in 2015, a research-minded company, adopting, adapting and
developing the latest state-of-the-art machine learning technologies. Jalgos advises some of the
leading European companies. Before Jaglos and Irene, Julien worked for a few years as a
strategy consultant focusing on the banking industry, while teaching economics and
quantitative methods. He was also chief scientist at Nukomeet.
Julien graduated in physics and economics from l’École Polytechnique, Paris and then
specialized in statistics and international business at ENSAE and Sciences-Po.
Sebastien Lamy – blockchain technical lead
Sebastien co-founded Jalgos with Julien. Before Jalgos and Irene, he worked as an algorithmic
trader at Barclays in New York, building automated, A.I.-based trading programs to detect and
leverage signals in financial markets. Sebastien is well-versed in the US power trading market
and has been a blockchain enthusiast for many years.
Sébastien graduated from École Polytechnique, Paris in applied mathematics and finance, and
holds a Msc in financial modelling and statistics from NYU.
Emilie Cohen-Boulakia – Impact lead
Emilie has 10+ year work experience in risk, at Standard & Poor’s and Lehman Brothers. She
is passionate about impact investing, a field first encountered when working for a
philanthropic organisation in Hong Kong in 2011. Emilie holds an MSc in risk management
from Dauphine University, Paris
33
Thomas de Roquancourt – ICO marketing lead
Thomas is a blockchain enthusiast and an energy expert. Thomas worked for Natixis in
Houston, Texas as a vice-president in charge of energy project finance. Thomas then moved
to Zurich where he worked as a strategy consultant for Zurich Insurance. Thomas still lives
in Zurich and will lead Irene’s marketing strategy during the ICO.
Thomas holds an MBA from INSEAD and master in business from EM Lyon.
Louis Brun – Commercial lead
Louis is a business development professional with 9 years of experience in Fintech in New
York and London. He worked in various sales and relationship management roles at
Bloomberg, Moody's Analytics, Microsoft Services and TradingScreen.
Louis holds a B.A. from McGill University, an M.A. from NYU and an MBA from INSEAD
Charlotte Cohen – Visual Identity lead
Charlotte has 15years+ of experience in creating growth by designing unique and meaningful
branding for small to large companies. One of her latest mission was to rebrand
internationally awarded Interior Design Studio MBDS and sister brand And Objects
She holds a Msc in Art Direction and Graphic Design
7.2 SENIOR ADVISORS
Vidal Chriqui – blockchain senior advisor
Vidal Chriqui is a technical expert in distributed systems which led him to an early interest in
decentralized networks. As an early adopter of Bitcoin, he launched the first free french
speaking web series called Blockchain Révolution, which is composed of 10 hours of
exclusive lessons and interviews.
He is working with both large corporations and startups to help them develop new
blockchain-based products and innovations in the crypto space. He is also a regular speaker
evangelizing Bitcoin and more generally open distributed registry protocols.
Jean-Luc Dormoy – A.I. senior advisor
Jean-Luc Dormoy is Irene’s senior scientific advisor. Jean-Luc worked for 18 years at EDF (the French
electricity incumbent) and held several senior roles in the company, most notably EDF’s
Smart Metering Innovation Director. Jean-Luc is member of several French and European
committees dedicated to artificial intelligence.
Jean-Luc co-founded Vesta-System in 2010, a company specializing in advanced software for
smart buildings and micro grids management. Jean-Luc is also the Scientific Committee
Chairman of Kalray – a company that put on the market in 2012 a chip with 256 processors
dedicated to super-computing.
34
Cedric Parent – senior advisor
Cedric has 20+ years of experience in commodity markets. He held a number of leadership
positions in leading financial institutions (BNP Paribas, Merrill Lynch, MUFG). He was Head
of Asia Commodities at Mitsubishi UFJ Securities.
Cedric is currently undertaking the Executive MBA at INSEAD Singapore
35
8 INDICATIVE PROCEEDS OF TOKEN SALE
The funds of the Token Sales (Pre-Sale + Main Sale I + Main Sale II) will be mainly used to cover Irene’s
needs in terms of legal and licensing costs, technological development, operations and marketing.
The Pre-Sale proceeds are expected to be primarily used to finalize Irene’s technology and to prepare for
the Main Sale.
The proceeds of the Main Sale I are expected to be primarily used for marketing and business
development needs in Europe.
The proceeds of the Main Sale II are expected to be primarily used for marketing and business
development needs in the US.
At its own discretion, Irene Energy’s team can however modify this allocation if it deems it necessary to
better develop Irene’s platform.
Assuming EUR 0.5million of proceeds for the Pre-Sale, EUR 15million of proceeds for the Main Sale I
(May 2018) and EUR 15million of proceeds for the Main Sale II (December 2018), the split could
indicatively be as follow:
8.1 LICENSING & LEGAL Licensing and legal costs relate to setting up retail and wholesale operations in Irene’s targeted markets.
Regulations and requirements differ from one jurisdiction to the next but the largest share of those costs
will be posting collateral (/depositing funds) to cover wholesaling market operations. Those funds will
only be deposited and it is important to note that because most of those markets strongly encourage new
entrants, facilitation measures are in place: such as limiting the required deposits for as long as operations
are being set up or delegating some functions to larger market participants.
When operations will ramp up, required collateral will do too – but by then, Irene will have the means to
cover them.
20%
40%
40%
5%
24%
10%
61%
Legal & licences
Technology
Operations
Marketing & Business dev.
4%10%
10%
76%
36
8.2 TECHNOLOGICAL INTEGRATION Getting Irene fully ready for commercialization is expected to require an additional several months of
work and a combined effort from our data scientist team, artificial intelligence experts, software engineers
and power market experts.
8.3 OPERATIONS & ADMINISTRATION Operations cover day-to-day operations, overheads and participating to industry events.
8.4 MARKETING Most of the proceeds of Main Sale I and II will be spent to acquire Irene’s initial customer base in Europe
and in the US. As described in the route-to-market section, we’ll initially aim at onboarding some
production capacity and commercial clients. Building up on this initial customer base and reaching out to
the wider residential base will require additional funds. We expect this wider campaign to be financed by
combination of opening up Irene’s capital, issuing debt and re-investing profits.
For the Pre-Sale, marketing means preparation of the Main Sale I.
37
REFERENCES
1. Gallup. http://news.gallup.com/poll/206030/global-warming-concern-three-decade-high.aspx.
2. Ofgem (UK regulator).
https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/system/files/docs/2016/08/retail_energy_markets_in_2016.pdf.
3. Ofgem, (UK regulator). https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/data-portal/electricity-supply-market-shares-company-
domestic-gb.
4. Le Monde. http://abonnes.lemonde.fr/economie/article/2017/10/20/chaque-mois-edf-perd-100-000-
clients_5203673_3234.html.
5. National Grid. http://powerresponsive.com/.
6. The Financial Times. https://www.ft.com/content/fb264f96-5088-11e6-8172-e39ecd3b86fc.
7. Bloomberg. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-03/for-cheapest-power-on-earth-look-
skyward-as-coal-falls-to-solar.
8. BCG Perspective. https://www.bcg.com/en-gb/publications/2017/green-energy-environment-power-
utilities-finding-the-sweet-spot-in-distributed-energy.aspx.
9. —. https://www.bcg.com/en-gb/publications/2016/energy-environment-rewiring-utilities-power-market-
future.aspx.
10. EIA, (US Energy Information Administration). https://www.eia.gov/electricity/annual/.
11. —. https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/pdf/0383(2017).pdf.
12. European Union. https://ec.europa.eu/energy/en/news/eleven-eu-countries-hit-2020-renewable-energy-
targets.
13. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/feb/09/new-energy-europe-renewable-
sources-2016.
14. MIT Sloan - Zach Church. http://mitsloan.mit.edu/newsroom/articles/blockchain-explained/.
15. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethereum.
16. Forbes - Mavadiya Madhvi. https://www.forbes.com/sites/madhvimavadiya/2017/08/22/blockchain-
bitcoin-ethereum/#5453c7906df9.
17. Groarke David. Energy and blockchain: here are the most promising applications. s.l. :
http://www.theenergycollective.com/indigoadvisorygroup/2399747/energy-blockchain-go-
global%E2%80%8A-utilities-startups-use-cases.
18. Rocky Mountain Institute - Douglas Miller, Claire Henly. Blockchain Is Reimagining the Rules of the Game
in the Energy Sector. s.l. : https://www.rmi.org/news/blockchain-reimagining-rules-game-energy-sector/.
19. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_fixing.
20. NYSERDA, (New York State Energy Research and Development Authority).
https://www.nyserda.ny.gov/Researchers-and-Policymakers/Energy-Prices/Electricity/Monthly-Avg-Electricity-
Residential.
21. EIA, (US Energy Information Administration).
https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/update/wholesale_markets.php.
38
22. NYISO, (New York Independent System Operator). p31,
http://www.nyiso.com/public/webdocs/media_room/publications_presentations/Power_Trends/Power_Trend
s/2017_Power_Trends.pdf. 2017.
23. Ofgem, (UK regulator). https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/data-portal/breakdown-electricity-bill.
24. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Data_Protection_Regulation. Wikipedia.
25. MIT. Smart Wind and Solar Power Big data and artificial intelligence are producing ultra-accurate forecasts
that will make it feasible to integrate much more renewable energy into the grid. s.l. :
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/526541/smart-wind-and-solar-power/, 2014.
26. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wavelet.
27. Grossman, Morlet,. Decomposition of Hardy functions into square integrable wavelets of constant shape,
Soc. Int. Am. Math. (SIAM), J. Math. Analys.,.
28. Short-term Wind Power Forecasting in Portugal by Neural Networks and Wavelet Transform. Catalão,
Pousinho, Mendes. 2010.
29. Forecasting Aggregated Wind Power Production of Multiple Wind Farms Using Hybrid Wavelet-PSO-NNs.
Mandala, Zareipourb, Rosehartb. s.l. : International Journal of Energy Research, 2014.
30. Short-Term Wind Power Prediction Using a Wavelet Support Vector Machine. Zeng, Qiao. s.l. : University of
Nebraska, 2012.
31. Benefits of spatio-temporal modelling for short term wind power forecasting at both individual and
aggregated levels. Lenzi, Steinsland and Pinsonk. April 2017.
32. TensorFlow. https://www.tensorflow.org/.
33. Elexon (UK power market regulator). https://www.bmreports.com/bmrs/?q=generation/.
34. RTE (French grid operator). http://clients.rte-
france.com/lang/an/visiteurs/vie/prod/prevision_production.jsp.
35. Amprion (German grid operator). https://www.amprion.net/Energy-Market/Balancing-Groups/Balancing-
Group-Price.
36. Deep Forecast: Deep Learning-based Spatio-Temporal Forecasting. Ghaderi, Sanandaji. July 2017.
37. Day-ahead forecasting of solar power output from photovoltaic plants in the American Southwest. Larson,
Nonnenmacher, Coimbra. s.l. : Elsevier, 2016.
38. Day-ahead forecasting of solar photovoltaic output power using multilayer perceptron. Ehsan, Simon,
Venkateswaran. s.l. : Springer, 2016, Vol. Neural Computing and Applications.
39. Using Stellar for ICO. https://www.stellar.org/blog/using-stellar-for-ico/.
40. Settlar.org. https://www.stellar.org/blog/tokens-on-stellar/.
41. Electricity Local. https://www.electricitylocal.com/states/new-york/.
42. Google. https://www.google.com/about/datacenters/renewable/.
43. Amazon. https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/sustainability/.
44. Bloomberg. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-07-06/the-electric-car-revolution-is-
accelerating.
45. New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/26/world/europe/uk-diesel-petrol-
emissions.html?mcubz=0.
39
46. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/jul/06/france-ban-petrol-diesel-cars-2040-
emmanuel-macron-volvo.
47. Platts. https://www.platts.com/latest-news/electric-power/houston/ercot-real-time-power-prices-spike-
above-1000mwh-21877216.
48. Financial Times. https://www.ft.com/content/5164675e-1e7e-11e6-b286-cddde55ca122.
49. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Powerwall#Powerwall_specifications.
50. Short and mid-term wind power plants forecasting with ANN. Mahmoudi, Javad, Jamil, Majid and Balaghi,
Hossein. 2012, Requirements Engineering, pp. 167-171.
52. Coinbase. https://www.coinbase.com/.
53. Georgia Tech. https://www.scl.gatech.edu/about/scl/history.
54. World Shipping Council. http://www.worldshipping.org/about-the-industry/history-of-
containerization/industry-globalization.
55. The Telegraph. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2017/07/03/hinkley-nuclear-costs-climb-almost-
20bn-start-delayed/.
56. Foundation, Ethereum. https://ethereum.org/.
57. Power, Wind. https://www.thewindpower.net/developer_en_2808_an-avel-braz.php.