Efficiency‑Sustainability Models to Assess Blockchain Adoption Strategies with Uncertainty in the Oil and Gas Sector

Abstract

The Oil and Gas (O&G) supply chain, vital for energy delivery, faces challenges such as excessive paperwork, limited transparency, and sustainability issues due to conventional governance methods. This study develops a decision support framework for evaluating blockchain deployment strategies in the sector, focusing on cost, profit, and income. The framework evaluates blockchain strategies under both deterministic and non-deterministic conditions using Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) models to assess cost-efficiency, profit-efficiency, and income-efficiency. The analysis provides a comprehensive view of the evaluation landscape, aimed at enhancing supply chain managers’ decision-making. Application of the framework to the Norwegian O&G industry revealed notable differences in outcomes between cost-efficiency and profit-efficiency models. The cost-efficiency model favored a single-use strategy, while the profit-efficiency model preferred a substitution strategy. Additionally, the study found that strategies’ effectiveness varied under deterministic versus uncertain conditions, with a single-use strategy being more effective in deterministic conditions and a localization strategy in mixed conditions. Statistical analysis indicated significant variance between the cost and profit approaches, highlighting that the developed framework offers a more nuanced perspective for supply chain managers to make informed decisions. To the best of our knowledge, this research is the first attempt to simultaneously consider blockchain adoption strategies under profit, cost, income, uncertainty, and optimization models.