Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index • Hacker News Board

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#71

Post by therealEleix » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:50 PM UTC

devoutsalsa wrote: post #36

dstick wrote: post #7

Question that came to mind after reading the headline: could this become a future reason for governments to criminalise the trading / use of Bitcoin because of negative environmental effects? On the surface it seems the value of Bitcoin is directly tied to its energy consumption and thus environmental harm. I get that Bitcoin itself is decentralised and cannot be banned outright. But could it be neutered in such a wa…

After all the Bitcoin is mined, it will be the greenest crypto currency, yes?. What if we just accelerated the mining, or made them all available at once. Problem solved? Truth be told, I really don't know what I'm talking about. It just sounded good in my head.

Impossible due to how cryptocurrency works. In any cryptocurrency there is something called an "emissions target" which will only up to X amount of coins to be "released" on the discovery of a new block. This is also compounded by the fact that even if you did try to accelerate the mining by adding more powerful nodes into the network, the network would automatically adjust the difficulty in order to keep blocks spitting out at the predetermined time of 10 minutes per block.

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#72

Post by aspic » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:50 PM UTC

IgorPartola wrote: post #10

Slightly off topic, but does anyone have any good resources on how alternative consensus protocols work, like proof of stake and proof of importance? I either see really simplistic explanations or ones that assume a lot of domain knowledge. I also recently saw a crypto coin that claims to be energy efficient, and I don’t quite understand how that’s possible without the possibility of a 50.1% attack.

You're perhaps thinking of https://nano.org ? A brief description of it's Open Representative Voting (ORV) consensus mechanism:

"A consensus mechanism unique to Nano which involves accounts delegating their balance as voting weight to Representatives. The Representatives vote themselves on the validity of transactions published to the network using the voting weight delegated to them. These votes are shared with their directly connected peers and they also rebroadcast votes seen from Principal Representatives. Votes are tallied and once quorum is reached on a published block, it is considered confirmed by the network."

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#73

Post by MereInterest » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:50 PM UTC

devoutsalsa wrote: post #36

dstick wrote: post #7

Question that came to mind after reading the headline: could this become a future reason for governments to criminalise the trading / use of Bitcoin because of negative environmental effects? On the surface it seems the value of Bitcoin is directly tied to its energy consumption and thus environmental harm. I get that Bitcoin itself is decentralised and cannot be banned outright. But could it be neutered in such a wa…

After all the Bitcoin is mined, it will be the greenest crypto currency, yes?. What if we just accelerated the mining, or made them all available at once. Problem solved? Truth be told, I really don't know what I'm talking about. It just sounded good in my head.

Nope. Bitcoin transactions require wasting energy. It is built into the very fabric of bitcoin. Currently, the energy wasters ("miners") are compensated by the minting of new bitcoins, and some transaction fees. As the number of bitcoins asymptomatically approaches it's maximum, the energy wasters are still compensated, but more and more through transaction fees.

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#74

Post by peteretep » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:51 PM UTC

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #8

peteretep wrote: post #3

Genuine question: how much does this matter if much of it is renewables and cheap hydro? I feel like the negative externalities of using a lot of electricity are very very tied to where that electricity came from

Is there reason to believe even a majority comes from renewable sources? And then, how much of that clean energy could be powering other things which are instead using fossil fuels?

I’d half remembered mining clusters near large hydro projects in China. As to the opportunity cost, getting the electricity from one place to another where it can be used if you have a local glut isn’t easy, aiui

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#75

Post by peteretep » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:51 PM UTC

raziel2p wrote: post #35

peteretep wrote: post #3

Genuine question: how much does this matter if much of it is renewables and cheap hydro? I feel like the negative externalities of using a lot of electricity are very very tied to where that electricity came from

Even if all of Bitcoin uses renewables, that's demand for renewable energy that drives prices up, which will lead other energy consumers to either pay more or pick less expensive non-renewable energy sources instead.

I don’t think power markets are that fluid in most of the world

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#76

Post by gruez » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:51 PM UTC

frr149 wrote: post #48

Havoc wrote: post #4

Perhaps not all of it is entirely "wasted" though. I've largely been able to avoid heating this winter as a result of crypto mining. A computer pumping ~300W into the air 24/7 is remarkably effective for a small apartment

Can you successfully mine bitcoin with one computer these days?

It's done with ASICs these days but the general idea of using the waste heat still holds.

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#77

Post by charcircuit » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:51 PM UTC

Jonnax wrote: post #23

From what I understand bitcoin currently has a $20+ transaction fee with a transaction time takes 60 minutes+ With these issues in addition to the high power consumption, how will Bitcoin become a usable currency?

It's about $7 at the moment to be included in the next block. A new block is added approximately every 10 minutes. Since bitcoin does not guarantee finality some services require you to wait for a certain amount of extra blocks after yours to reduce the chance of a change reorginaztion happening that doesn't include your transaction.

Bitcoin will not function as a currency due to it's high volatility. For a more usable currency look at DAI, USDT, and USDC which are stable coins pegged to the dollar. DAI is collateralized with on chain assets where USDT and USDC are collateralized with real life assets which are mainly regular USD.

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#78

Post by theblazehen » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:51 PM UTC

devoutsalsa wrote: post #36

dstick wrote: post #7

Question that came to mind after reading the headline: could this become a future reason for governments to criminalise the trading / use of Bitcoin because of negative environmental effects? On the surface it seems the value of Bitcoin is directly tied to its energy consumption and thus environmental harm. I get that Bitcoin itself is decentralised and cannot be banned outright. But could it be neutered in such a wa…

After all the Bitcoin is mined, it will be the greenest crypto currency, yes?. What if we just accelerated the mining, or made them all available at once. Problem solved? Truth be told, I really don't know what I'm talking about. It just sounded good in my head.

Better solution would be to choose a proof of stake cryptocurrency instead

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#79

Post by gambiting » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:51 PM UTC

onion2k wrote: post #60

AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It won't and even BTC enthusiasts have given up on that. They narrative is now that BTC is a "store of value".

It won't It won't for small transactions . Buying a car or a house with BTC could still be viable in the future.

I still don't see how. When we bought our house in the UK I sent the entire transfer from my phone, paid 0 fee, and it arrived 30 seconds later. Why would I use bitcoin for it?

Re: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

#80

Post by Spooky23 » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:51 PM UTC

josalhor wrote: post #29

peteretep wrote: post #3

Genuine question: how much does this matter if much of it is renewables and cheap hydro? I feel like the negative externalities of using a lot of electricity are very very tied to where that electricity came from

If you freed all those resources, you could equivalently reduce fossil fuel consumption (up to 0%, of course). So I say it matters very much.

If you made it a crime to fly to tropical islands to enjoy the beach in the winter, you would enjoy a reduction in fossil fuels too, and people would be more productive than loafing about on the beach.

End of the day, people choose to spend resources on things that provide utility to them.