Feb 5, 2026 | Parameter Committee Triweekly - meeting notes

1. Governance Action Status: Memory Unit Increase

The committee reviewed the ongoing vote to increase Plutus memory limits.

  • Turnout Trends: Initial participation was low, but a targeted campaign has moved SPO participation to 22% and DREP approval to 39%.
  • The “Participation Lesson”: Some members argued that a failure of this action—while detrimental to near-term scaling—might serve as a necessary “adult conversation” for the community regarding the consequences of non-participation.
  • Stakes: Failure would block several pending updates, including the reduction of the committee size and new Plutus cost models.

2. Van Rossem Hard Fork & Cost Model Assurance

The committee discussed the transition to the Van Rossem era (Protocol Version 11) and the risks associated with new Plutus primitives.

  • Unified Primitives: The update unifies support for primitives across Plutus V1, V2, and V3.
  • Regression Risks: Members expressed concern over the lack of system-level benchmarking. Currently, testing is limited to reference implementations because an integrated node version is not yet available for full-scale regression testing.
  • Automation: To mitigate systemic risk and human error (such as historical “positional set” misinterpretations), there is a call to allocate budget for automated consistency checking and AI-assisted verification of cost models.

3. Treasury Net Change Limit (NCL) Proposal

Ryan (Cerkoryn) introduced a draft CIP to transform the Net Change Limit (NCL) from a social “info action” into a formal on-chain protocol parameter.

Feature Description
Function Controls treasury spending relative to income (e.g., 100% = balanced budget).
Window Uses a rolling 73-epoch period (approximately one year) to avoid “end-of-year” spending rushes.
Classification Debated as a Governance Parameter (75% DREP threshold) due to its role in the constitution.
  • Ledger Enforcement: The committee strongly favors on-chain enforcement. Rather than a “social signal,” the ledger should automatically reject treasury withdrawals that exceed the NCL based on the rolling look-back window.
  • Philosophical Debate: Some members cautioned that an NCL might impose a “corporate budgeting” mindset on a decentralized ecosystem, though they acknowledged the rolling window approach mitigates some of these concerns.