Evaluating Cost-Effective Consensus Algorithms to Enhance Blockchain Scalability in Low-Resource Education Systems

Abstract

The issues such as the fake credentials, delays in verification, and vulnerable centralized data have increased the demand for a safe and tamper-proof academic credentialing system. Blockchain is a great solution, but conventional consensus algorithms involve resource-intensive traditional consensus algorithms, which generally require high computational power and energy consumption, making it unsuitable for low-resource settings. This research investigates cost-effective consensus algorithms to enhance blockchain scalability while ensuring security and efficiency. The methodology consists of preparation of a dataset of blockchain-based academic records, data preprocessing, and extraction of key performance metrics such as TPS(Transaction Per Second),and block latency. It evaluated the existing performance and scalability issues in academic systems and consensus algorithms and identified Proof of Stake, Delegated Proof of Stake, Proof of Authority, and Practical Byzantine Fault Tolerance as suitable consensus algorithms for low-resource settings. Because they are comparatively low resource intensive, cost-effective and fast. A private Ethereum blockchain environment had been emulated using Ganache, where an analysis of consensus algorithms considering different parameter. PoA achieved the highest TP with minimal latency and other relevant parameters also should be evaluated to get the more accurate decision. As compared to the real-world blockchain implementations, higher throughput was generated in the simulated environments due to the absence of consensus overhead; therefore, extended real-world validation is required. The study contributes to developing scalable and cost-effective blockchain solutions for academic credentialing in low-resource settings, providing insight into the performance-security-affordability trade-offs.