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Bitcoin miners are buying power plants

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Re: Bitcoin miners are buying power plants

#191

Post by shawnz »

lottin wrote: post #182
shawnz wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, are you saying that new technologies must be considered wasteful if they don't wholly replace existing technologies and instead create new usages of their own? For example would you say that smartphones are wasteful because they allow us to communicate more frequently than we could before, thus they don't strictly replace an existing consumption of energy? That seems like a silly interpretation to me. Of course o…

The argument is not so much that cryptocurrencies don't replace anything as that they don't have a use case (this is something that we can observe, unlike "value" which is subjective), and therefore it could be argued they are objectively useless regardless of their actual value in the market.

Bitcoin certainly has a use case, just observe how it is being used today, every day. Not just to buy drugs online, but also for example to escape oppressive currency controls, defend against questionably ethical practices like civil forfeiture, etc.

If you are saying that it doesn't have intrinsic value, then yes of course that is true, but I don't see how that makes it useless (unless you think cash is also useless)

Re: Bitcoin miners are buying power plants

#192

Post by SwimSwimHungry »

jude- wrote: post #183
SwimSwimHungry wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh boy, someone on the Internet wants me to calm down because I point out that they are making a lazy point. Sheesh, tough crowd! Whether you realize it or not, you can want to not burn fossil fuels, but if there's a profit to be made doing it, believe me, enough miners will bend their morality to make a profit. You act like everyone involved in this experiment has pure intentions. I'd argue that's untrue.

You'd be a lot more convincing if you weren't in the throes of a hissyfit over something that's 0.5% of the US's total CO2 output in 2019. It's not great, but it's far from the worst problem. Like, bad building insulation in 2016 is responsible for _3x_ the CO2 emissions of Bitcoin _today_. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26829795 .

But Bitcoin is only going to continue to grow exponentially and the CO2 emissions by it will easily outpace building insulation problems.

And how is making points to the contrary of yours copping a hissie-fit? I'm just having a disagreement. Not everyone shares your world view.

Re: Bitcoin miners are buying power plants

#193

Post by bawolff »

SwimSwimHungry wrote: post #103
baron816 wrote: post #88

Easy solution: tax carbon emissions. Who cares if you’re using energy to mine Bitcoin? Or if you’re using it to play video games? Or to run the AC all day? If it you’re internalizing the cost of any emissions, then you’ll use those resources efficiently.

Hard to do this when you can have other countries with much looser regulations allow Bitcoin miners run rampant. What probably should happen is to make converting from any cryptocurrency to major world currencies a crime. I have no delusions that this will halt activity in this sector entirely, but it will make it reasonably difficult to make any substantial money this way without raising some serious eyebrows.

> Hard to do this when you can have other countries with much looser regulations allow Bitcoin miners run rampant.

And yet we've done this for other pollutants. CFC's aren't destroying the ozone layer anymore.

Re: Bitcoin miners are buying power plants

#194

Post by jude- »

SwimSwimHungry wrote: post #185
jude- wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here, let me Google that for you. First, let's assume for a moment that this February 2021 CNBC source [1] is correct in that Bitcoin mining produces 36.94 megatons of CO2 per year. The original source the CNBC article cited can be found here: [3] (which currently pegs Bitcoin at 47.62 megatons/year). According to the EPA, the US economy alone produced 6,558 megatons of CO2 [2] in 2019 (i.e. under pre-COVID emissions…

My response to you is quite simple. Unlike virtually every other technology that's been created (like computers, cars, smartphones, etc), Bitcoin simply exists in a form where the primary purpose is to waste energy, and the system inherently incentivizes it. Also, the issue of bad building insulation does not in any manner invalidate my concern with the growing problem of Bitcoin now and in the future . Bad building…

> Bitcoin simply exists in a form where the primary purpose is to waste energy,

That's just your moral judgement. The people who use and make a living off of Bitcoin certainly don't see it as a waste.

> In order for the network to remain secure, it must burn copious amounts of energy.

First, this does not preclude PoW from existing in a world powered 100% renewable energy. Second, I've already outlined a way to economically penalize PoW miners for using fossil fuels here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26829269.

Please do not make the mistake of believing that your (rightful) concerns about CO2 emissions from PoW are being overlooked, and please do not make the mistake of thinking that they cannot be addressed. PoW does not require burning fossil fuels to work.

Re: Bitcoin miners are buying power plants

#195

Post by young_unixer »

ayngg wrote: post #159
bransonf wrote: post #94

It’s a simple equation: So long as there is more money in mining BTC than there is cost in energy to mine it, mining will proceed. No entity in the world can control the price of crypto. But, we can and already do regulate energy production. I think we need a carbon tax, that is specifically a financial disincentive towards any means of energy production that directly pollutes the atmosphere. Seriously, what are the…

To me it seems like Bitcoin (and other pow cryptocurrencies) are almost like the climate change scapegoat for a number of social and economic issues that have seemingly come to a head recently to facilitate their rise. People mine because it is expensive, it isn't the other way around, so the real questions we should be asking in good faith are things like "Why it is profitable in the first place?" and I think it is…

Yes. Cryptocurrencies are used because they're the only market that hasn't yet been regulated to death. People come to Bitcoin for 2 reasons, mainly:

1. It's a practical way to store value without the government destroying it by monetary emission.

2. People are free to speculate.

The solution to the first point is that governments should stop pulling the rug from under people's feet. Monetary emission should be predictable in the short, medium, and long term, or be tied to some real world indicator, like the cost of consumer goods. Just stop with this inflationary nonsense.

Problem 2 will be partially solved by time. Relative price changes in Bitcoin are reduced each cycle, so by the year 2030 the incentive to speculate in the short term will be much smaller. We will see it more as a long term investment. Another solution is to deregulate other markets so that we can freely speculate in them and stop putting as much attention to Bitcoin, but I don't think politicians are very eager to do that, and it could also have some negative consequences.

Re: Bitcoin miners are buying power plants

#196

Post by thatcat »

SwimSwimHungry wrote: post #87
caterama wrote: post #68

Who cares? Everyone is fixated on Bitcoin... there are tons of energy inefficient processes out there. The solution has nothing to do with Bitcoin... environmental impact needs to be priced into energy itself, whatever the application. This is a failure of the markets (and therefore ourselves). Bitcoin is a scapegoat.

Here's the problem with this sentiment. Bitcoin isn't replacing anything. Not pre-existing fiat currency, not banks, nothing. Bitcoin only adds to the problem at an alarming rate. Bitcoin is certainly not a scapegoat. It's a massive problem and, largely, a symptom of human greed that must be put in check.

Many things are symptoms of human greed, isn't that what capitalist societies are built on, after all? If carbon was taxed, you'd see a huge investment in green energy and nuclear from both BTC and everyone else then it wouldn't matter. Why should one industry pay for externalities and another not?

Re: Bitcoin miners are buying power plants

#197

Post by chii »

zepto wrote: post #131
chii wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Bitcoin produces... trust. It's only a moral judgement that bitcoin energy use is somehow worse than say, transport, or heating, or anything else that people pay money for.

Bitcoin doesn’t produce trust. It just produces a verified log.

which people trust to be unmodifiable and thus, dependable. That's what it means to trust it.

I have blind faith in the banking system (and blind faith that the gov't regulation keeps them honest), but i can trust the blockchain.

Re: Bitcoin miners are buying power plants

#198

Post by reader_mode »

ayngg wrote: post #159
bransonf wrote: post #94

It’s a simple equation: So long as there is more money in mining BTC than there is cost in energy to mine it, mining will proceed. No entity in the world can control the price of crypto. But, we can and already do regulate energy production. I think we need a carbon tax, that is specifically a financial disincentive towards any means of energy production that directly pollutes the atmosphere. Seriously, what are the…

To me it seems like Bitcoin (and other pow cryptocurrencies) are almost like the climate change scapegoat for a number of social and economic issues that have seemingly come to a head recently to facilitate their rise. People mine because it is expensive, it isn't the other way around, so the real questions we should be asking in good faith are things like "Why it is profitable in the first place?" and I think it is…

I think Bitcoin (and crypto in general) has prooven to be disruptive in many areas (in a negative way) and has yet to deliver any tangible positives that would outweight the negatives.

It's basically becoming a unregulated comodity that big money institutions get to gamble with because there is just nowhere to put the money on the market right now. If bitcoin and crypto (ETH, etc.) was just a money dumping speculation comodities I wouldn't even bother thinking about it - but it's causing realworld problems (eg. hardware disruptions) and it's going to get worse and worse.

So I'm in favor of preventing institutional investors in crypto in some form, but unfortunately it's not going to happen - too many individual interests behind it at this point and nobody gives a fuck about the overall stability.

Re: Bitcoin miners are buying power plants

#199

Post by seibelj »

SwimSwimHungry wrote: post #99
maxerickson wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's reasonably likely that there will be a run on dollars at some point. If/when it happens, the bitcoin network collapsing is a pretty likely outcome. (what I mean by a run on dollars is that lots of people may decide they want dollars instead of bitcoin, so the people with dollars won't have to pay as much for bitcoin, and then the people who want dollars will have to accept less for their bitcoin, and then…)

@maxerickson That ultimately will be the end game. I'd argue that most of the folks that bought into Bitcoin do not, in fact, share in the an-cap libertarian utopia of an economy entirely detached from the US Dollar. Folks are going to want their payday, even folks like Michael Saylor and Elon Musk. These guys aren't HODLing for charity. They want to exit before the rest of the peanut gallery does.

I philosophically believe, to my core, that one of the greatest evils ever perpetuated on humanity was allowing governments to print money whenever they wanted. With very few exceptions, every single fiat currency has experienced periods of high or extremely high inflation (including USD in the 70s). Giving those in power the ability to dilute everyone else’s wealth and direct new money to their favored people / projects is a major reason why inequality has spiked and everything good in the world (high quality housing, education, healthcare, food) has become very expensive relative to wages.

The relatively brief experiment with fiat currencies has been a disaster. We need something like gold (bitcoin) to bring government back into check and reward savers once again.

Re: Bitcoin miners are buying power plants

#200

Post by spiorf »

SwimSwimHungry wrote: post #127
zepto wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you considered that they wouldn’t be trying to turn electricity into money and might be making money some other way?

And to your point, likely a way that doesn't have global implications? Even other bubbles of the past didn't have quite the reach that the likes of Bitcoin has (maybe with the exception of the entire stock market in the Roaring 20s leading right up to the crash of 1929). That's why this time, this is much more dangerous in the long run.

What about the hypotesis that a global shared ledger under no-one's control with thermodynamical guarantee of immutability actually has some value?
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