Smart Transport Infrastructure Maintenance: A Smart-Contract Blockchain Approach

TL;DR

This paper explores how blockchain-based smart contracts can automate and enhance the maintenance of transport infrastructure, improving transparency, efficiency, and trust among multiple stakeholders.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive framework integrating smart contracts, process mining, and IoT data for automated infrastructure maintenance management.

Findings

Smart contracts enable end-to-end automation of maintenance processes.

Blockchain provides transparent, immutable records for contract fulfillment.

Integration of IoT and data analytics enhances maintenance decision-making.

Abstract

Infrastructure maintenance is inherently complex, especially for widely dispersed transport systems like roads and railroads. Maintaining this infrastructure involves multiple partners working together to ensure safe, efficient upkeep that meets technical and safety standards, with timely materials and budget adherence. Traditionally, these requirements are managed on paper, with each contract step checked manually. Smart contracts, based on blockchain distributed ledger technology, offer a new approach. Distributed ledgers facilitate secure, transparent transactions, enabling decentralized agreements where contract terms automatically execute when conditions are met. Beyond financial transactions, blockchains can track complex agreements, recording each stage of contract fulfillment between multiple parties. A smart contract is a set of coded rules stored on the blockchain that automatically executes each term upon meeting specified conditions. In infrastructure maintenance, this enables end-to-end automation-from contractor assignment to maintenance completion. Using an immutable, decentralized record, contract terms and statuses are transparent to all parties, enhancing trust and efficiency. Creating smart contracts for infrastructure requires a comprehensive understanding of procedural workflows to foresee all requirements and liabilities. This workflow includes continuous infrastructure monitoring through a dynamic, data-driven maintenance model that triggers necessary actions. Modern process mining can develop a resilient Maintenance Process Model, helping Operations Management to define contract terms, including asset allocation, logistics, materials, and skill requirements. Automation and reliable data quality across the procedural chain are essential, supported by IoT sensors, big data analytics, predictive maintenance, intelligent logistics, and asset management.