Japan's third largest power supplier "Chubu Electric Power" successfully conducted a lightning network micropayment trial

According to coindesk, Japan's third largest power supplier, Chubu Electric Power, has reached a cooperation with Internet of Things startup Nayuta to test Bitcoin payments on the Lightning Network.

For many IoT devices, it is very important to be able to make real-time payments. However, in actual transaction scenarios, congestion is a big problem. Therefore, Chubu Electric Power hopes to develop a payment method based on the Lightning Network that allows customers to make payments on it for charging electric vehicles.

Also participating in the project is Japanese software startup Infoteria, which is responsible for developing the mobile terminal and integrating various functions. The latest experimental scenario of this project is the electric vehicle charging pile. In the experiment, Chubu Electric Power and Nayuta connected the nodes of the lightning network to the electric vehicle charging pile, and then to the car. After the user pays, the charging pile can quickly receive instructions from the network and start charging the electric vehicle.

Hidehiro Ichikawa, a senior manager at Chubu Electric Power, said in an interview that the project is part of Chubu Electric Power’s “market research” to understand how bitcoin can power Internet of Things devices.

However, he stressed that Chubu Electric Power has not yet officially accepted users to use the Lightning Network for payment.

Currently, Nayuta is continuing to develop the project and working to make the mobile terminal compatible with the other three major lightning networks currently in use. Nayuta CEO Kenichi Kurimoto believes that the success of this test is a potential signal that companies will be interested in using cryptocurrency payments based on the lightning network on IoT devices.