Upgrade 16 prepares for Superchain interop by including all of the smart contract changes required to support the interop launch date, though it does not turn interop on yet. The upgrade also increases OP Stack decentralization and security by removing a permissioned role and guaranteeing that the OP Stack continues to meet L2Beat’s updated Stage 1 criteria.

Additionally, Upgrade 16 includes a number of maintenance features and improvements to the OP Stack experience. Cannon is being updated to support Go 1.23, which allows the OP Stack to stay up to date with upstream changes to go-ethereum. The upgrade also enables OP Stack chains to scale further with an increase in the maximum allowed gas limit from 200 million gas per block to 500 million gas per block, made possible by recent improvements to the OP Stack proof system and other related infrastructure.

All details of the proposal can be found here: https://gov.optimism.io/t/upgrade-16-proposal-interop-contracts-stage-1-and-go-1-23-support-in-cannon/10037

This proposal is eligible for Special Voting Cycle 39b

If passed in the Token House, it will proceed to a veto period in the Citizens’ House. The new process for Upgrades will not go into effect until August 1st