PUBLIC BLOCKCHAIN – A SYSTEMATIC LITERATURE REVIEW ON THE SUSTAINABILITY OF CONSENSUS ALGORITHMS

Abstract

Blockchain has the potential to change business transactions to a major extent. Thereby, underlying consensus algorithms are the core mechanism to achieve consistency in distributed infrastructures. Their application aims for transparency and accountability in societal transactions. As a result of missing reviews holistically covering consensus algorithms, we aim to (1) identify prevalent consensus algorithms for public blockchains, and (2) address the resource perspective with a sustainability consideration, whereby we address the three spheres of sustainability. Our systematic literature review identified 33 different consensus algorithms for public blockchains. Our contribution is twofold: first, we provide a systematic summary of consensus algorithms for public blockchains derived from the scientific literature as well as real-world applications and systematize them according to their research focus; second, we assess the sustainability of consensus algorithms using a representative sample and thereby highlight the gaps in literature to address the holistic sustainability of consensus algorithms.