I believe some people care.
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Some do. But they donât want to reduce energy, they want to get cleaner energy. Bitcoin helps with that by increasing renewable adoption through quicker pay back.
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Guy in here using excess cooking oils to mine.
Hard to pinpoint the level of concern over bitcoinâs energy usage worldwide but there is evidence of it:
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All noise, attacks or virtue signalling.
They canât stop it. Itâs decentralised. China has already tried.
And those using this argument havenât done enough research.
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But that does give another point to SNT, doesnât it?
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If you believe btc mining is harming the planet. But it isnât, so no point. Sorry.
Itâs not a question of whether I believe it, only a question of whether it is a widespread belief, or concern.
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Only the truth matters.
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If only that were true.
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Sorry, that is just a lie. A flat out LIE.
No matter your stance on AGW, the profligate waste of energy on BTC mining is an abomination and to be abhorred by anyone other than a greed-driven BTC fanboi.
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" Conclusion
It is a fact that the Bitcoin network consumes a lot of electricity. Yet, the important question is what types of energy sources are used to maintain the Bitcoin network (i.e., fossil fuel vs. renewables). With this article, we have explained that the reward scheme of Bitcoin is beneficial for mining companies that have access to low-cost electricity. Recent studies have revealed that the share of renewable energy sources that supply the Bitcoin network is above 50% at this point in time.
We argue that highly efficient mining companies will drive companies operating with low efficiency out of business. The highly efficient mining companies will therefore demand energy-producing equipment that allows them to achieve this high efficiency â to remain profitable and to continue their operations. This pushes engineering companies and energy suppliers to improve equipment and to invest in R&D to improve the electricity-producing facilities and related equipment.
If the Bitcoin price increases substantially, these mechanisms will be stronger: Demand to access renewable energy and to access excess energy will be higher such that R&D in these facilities and equipment should even increase. We have presented two reasons for this: First, electricity from renewables â in particular hydro power plants â can be produced cheaper than electricity from fossil fuels. Second, excess electricity from renewables, which is not needed and cannot be stored, can be used for mining.
With this we have provided arguments for the following hypothesis: Bitcoin can play a role in making electricity production more efficient in the mid term. Even though Bitcoin consumes a very high degree of electricity, we also argue that Bitcoin can contribute to higher R&D investments in utilizing and harvesting renewable energies."
My point is that the energy-intensive mining of ANY crypto-currency is an offence against both the planet and the sensibilities of any engineer or anyone for that matter who has an interest in increasing efficiency and/or decreasing waste.
The source of the energy, renewable or not, is utterly irrelevant. There are far more worthwhile uses for that energy than to satisfy the whims of speculators, too lazy to find a more worthwhile form of employment.
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Worth watching. If Seba is right, and 90% of his predictions have arrived earlier than predicted, energy is going to be disrupted fast. Watch the series, its worth it:
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And once a similar product/technology is available that does the same thing or more than blockchain but without consuming massive amounts of energy it will be no contest. There is really no such thing as âexcess energy.â There is only energy available to do things. Why would anyone want one of those things to be mining bits? Literally any other use is more productive than that.
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Itâs offensive if you believe energy consumption is bad and also if you believe the thing consuming the energy has no purpose.
In my opinion energy consumption isnât bad and in Bitcoinâs case it has many ground breaking and disruptive purposes. One of them purposes is increasing the efficiency of the power grid. Many excellent engineers understand this. Which is counter to your waste argument.
Your opinion on what energy should be used for is just an opinion, as is mine. Letâs see what the market decides. Currently that is Bitcoin. The fact energy companies themselves are starting to mine bitcoin with their unused energy gives you a pretty good example that even those generating the energy see a purpose. You are also missing the point that btc can use energy that would not get used otherwise. So you can dream up all the ideas you want for using that energy, but in reality it doesnât get used, and sometimes pollutes our environment as it gets released; gas flares are a good example as are some Iâve posted above.
To start to understand the energy system you have to understand the duck curve. The most polluting period is at the top of the duck curve when peak usage occurs. This is usually around 4pm-7pm when everyone returns from work and is cooking. Many fossile fuel plants have to be running on standby just to meet the demand for that period. So it isnât the fact we use X amount of energy that is the problem. It is the unpredictable demand we put on the system. To level out that demand we need to use a collection of tools to spread out demand more evenly throughout the day as well as having tools that can quickly respond to drops in usage and increases in usage⌠Bitcoin mining is the perfect tool to do this, and is already doing this in some places. There isnât anything else that can do this as well as Bitcoin.
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As i mention above there is plenty of excess energy that cannot be used.
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Good video thanks. Jeff Booth talks a lot about these different technologies and their disruption.
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Iâve kept out of this energy discussion for a bit. I can see the benefits of using energy to secure the BTC network and I also see how the base price of BTC is also proportional to the cost of the energy miners have to expend with them requiring to receive more for their coins than the energy/equipt cost expended. I agree or have no problems with the benefits of BTC and its status.
But what bitcoin mining does for the energy grid is to increase the base load of the grid, it does little to help the peak loads and fluctuations and in fact makes it worse. All the problems for the energy grid are still there, bitcoin mining means that more generators are needed to be run all the time to cover the base load.
Power plants take a long time to be built, many years for planning and construction.
So for a grid that expects a peak load of X GW and we add Y GW (24/7) of bitcoin mining to the base load the peak load now becomes X+Y GW. All bitcoin mining did was extend the hours when the older more inefficient plants have to run because those older plants have to run even earlier to be prepared or some to just meet the base load now. It is in fact worse for the system. New plant will have to be planned and built.
If the local power company can source additional âgreenâ power in a short time period then this will assist in reducing the problem.
Keep using the that energy usage is good for BTC and its security, but its not for the power grid, it strains the grid until a minimum of 5 years to 15 years for extra plant (green or nuclear or fossil or âŚ) to be constructed. And if the miners can use their own solar/wind then all the better.
But it does not help the power grid, unless it is so under utilised that it needs more base load to keep that one generator running during the lowest demand period.
My experience/expertise is in 15 years of contract work helping build the systems to manage the network some years ago. A lot of experience in loads, managing the loads, etc was needed to be gained for this. And working in the control centre for the network also helped.
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Thanks @neo, You have said most that needs to be said to counter this crazy argument.
Another case of the greed-driven chanting âThe market is always correctâ which is as ever a convenient falsehood for the rich and selfish but a wonderful soundbite meant to batter those who dare quibble.
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