Windfall Protocol

P2P Protocol

An open-source blockchain-based protocol defining shared data infrastructure to accelerate residential and commercial building energy efficiency retrofits toward Canada's net-zero targets. Specifies three composable building blocks: (1) a Building Ledger — a per-building permissioned data registry aggregating audit data, energy feeds, retrofit attestations, and metadata; (2) an Attestation & Credentialing Service — governing read/write access for stakeholders including building owners, auditors, utilities, municipalities, and regulators using a Model-View-Controller permissioning pattern; and (3) a Targeted Incentive Policy Designer — enabling conditional, automated subsidy payouts via smart contracts triggered by verified energy efficiency outcomes. Designed to break data silos across multi-stakeholder energy retrofit ecosystems and close the feedback loop between retrofits and measurable energy outcomes. Piloting in Durham Region, Ontario with Natural Resources Canada funding.

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License Planned open source (report commits to open-source release; no repository published at time of writing; CC BY non-commercial license on report itself; https://windfallcentre.ca/windfallprotocol)
Dev Status 🔨 WIP
Dev Status Detail Pre-specification / WIP (Initial Research and Litepaper Development phases complete per roadmap; Development, Testnet, and Launch phases pending; no code deployed; MVP on closed testnet is next milestone pending additional funding)
Owner Windfall Protocol Research Group: Windfall Ecology Centre (Brent Kopperson), BlockScience (Jessica Zartler, Jeff Emmett, Michael Zargham, David Sisson, Kelsie Nabben), Possibilian (Michael Lewkowitz), SuperBenefit (Rowan Yeoman, Rathermercurial.eth, Ananth Nandakishore); Durham Region as pilot partner
Country Canada (Durham Region, Ontario pilot; Natural Resources Canada funder; distributed research team)
Start Year 2024
Stack Unconfirmed / Under evaluation (report identifies candidate technologies: Ethereum/EVM (smart contracts), Dynamic NFTs + EIP-6551 (building ledgers), Chainlink (off-chain data oracle), Ceramic Network (decentralised data storage + DIDs), Hats Protocol (on-chain role-based permissioning), Ethereum Attestation Service (attestation infrastructure); final stack to be determined in Development phase)
Funding Government grant (Natural Resources Canada — NRCan; additional funding being sought for Development and Testnet phases)
Last Investigated Jul 1, 2026

Use Case Domains

Platform Evolution & Sovereignty

P2P Protocol Attributes

Origins Civic infrastructure / Climate tech (motivated by Canada's net-zero building retrofit targets — at current rates residential retrofits would take 142 years to complete; initiated by NRCan request for proposals for digital infrastructure using IoT and DLTs to monitor energy usage and establish Live Labelling Systems)
Database Distributed (Building Ledger as permissioned on-chain data registry; off-chain data stored with on-chain attestation proofs; candidate: Ceramic Network leveraging IPFS + blockchain consensus; Green Button API for energy data feeds; HOT2000 outputs for audit data)
Query Language Unconfirmed (open API specified as requirement; candidate technologies include Ceramic Network queries and EVM RPC calls; Green Button API for energy data; final query interface TBD in Development phase)
Data Formats Green Button standard (energy usage data — XML/JSON); HOT2000 outputs (audit data — XML); EnerGuide labels (energy efficiency ratings); Dynamic NFT metadata (building ledger entries); W3C DIDs (stakeholder credentials via Ceramic); on-chain attestation proofs (Ethereum Attestation Service); geospatial data; property tax roll data (MPAC); additional data schemas registerable via attestation service
Collaborative Live Editing N/A (protocol specification; not an editing application)
Rich Text Editing N/A
Mobile Support N/A (protocol spec; reference applications TBD)
Web Support N/A (protocol spec; open API enables web-based application development on top)
Native Apps N/A
Terms Open source / Free (protocol committed to open-source release; report licensed CC BY non-commercial; no commercial terms established yet)
Funds Undisclosed amount from Natural Resources Canada for five-month research phase; additional funding sought for pilot implementation
Based On Candidate underlying technologies under evaluation: Ethereum/EVM (smart contracts and attestations); IPFS (distributed data storage); Ceramic Network (decentralised data + DIDs); Chainlink (oracle/off-chain data bridge); Hats Protocol (role-based permissions); Ethereum Attestation Service; EIP-6551 (token-bound accounts for building ledger NFTs); Green Button standard (energy data interoperability)
P2P Architecture Permissioned distributed ledger with role-based access control (Building Ledger as shared data registry; stakeholders assigned read/write permissions via Attestation & Credentialing Service using Model-View-Controller pattern; smart contract conditional incentives on satisfaction of verifiable conditions; DHT candidate for data storage via Ceramic/IPFS)
Overlay Network App-wide (Building Ledger network scoped to registered buildings and credentialed stakeholders within a deployment jurisdiction; designed for cross-jurisdictional extensibility in future phases)
Content Addressing Yes (on-chain attestation proofs reference off-chain data via cryptographic hashes; candidate Ceramic Network uses IPFS content addressing; immutable data integrity via blockchain cryptographic chaining cited as key architectural property)
Local-First N/A (protocol is infrastructure-layer; no local-first requirement specified; data stored on distributed ledger and off-chain storage with permissioned access)
E2EE Planned (zero-knowledge proofs and fully homomorphic encryption identified as further research priorities to enable privacy-preserving data analysis; ZKPs already in use in Ethereum Attestation Service for privacy-preserving attestations in pilot; private data need not be stored on-chain — verifiable attestations act as proofs of off-chain existence)
CRDTs Lib N/A (not identified in protocol design; append-only attestation model used instead of CRDT conflict resolution)
Byzantine Fault Tolerance Partial (Proof-of-Stake consensus mechanisms cited as preferred for energy efficiency — up to 99.95% less energy than PoW; BFT guarantees inherited from underlying blockchain; specific BFT mechanism dependent on final chain selection)
Signature Unconfirmed (Ed25519 likely via Ceramic/DID layer; Ethereum ECDSA for smart contract interactions; EAS uses cryptographic signatures for attestation proofs; final signature scheme TBD)
Permissions Role-based / Cryptographic Capabilities (Attestation & Credentialing Service assigns granular read/write permissions per stakeholder role — building owners, occupants, auditors, utilities, municipalities, regulators, NRCan each have differentiated access; Hats Protocol identified for on-chain role-based permissioning; customizable per jurisdiction deployment)
Semantic Web Compatibility Partial / Links (protocol requires data schema registration and harmonization across Green Button, HOT2000, EnerGuide, and geospatial standards; Ceramic Network uses DIDs; no explicit RDF/SPARQL/SOLID compatibility stated; semantic interoperability is a stated design goal via open API and schema registry)
Smart Contract Planned (Targeted Incentive Policy Designer explicitly uses smart contracts for conditional automated subsidy payouts; Ethereum smart contracts cited as enabling conditional processes and automated incentives; EIP-6551 for token-bound building ledger accounts; core to Phase 3 of protocol)
Protocol Stack Position Application-layer (built on TCP/IP and existing blockchain infrastructure; does not define transport-layer protocol; operates as application-layer coordination infrastructure on top of EVM-compatible blockchains and IPFS)
Asset / Value Embedding Application-layer add-on (energy efficiency incentives and subsidy payouts embedded at smart contract level as conditional triggers; not native packet-level value transfer; economic flows handled by Targeted Incentive Policy Designer as a composable module rather than protocol primitive)
Protocol Maturity / Standardization Pre-specification (research report / litepaper published 2024; no formal specification document; no standards body involvement; roadmap shows Development → Testnet → Launch as pending phases; Technology Readiness Level 2-3 at time of publication; protocol aims to reach TRL 5-6 via Durham pilot)