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Bitcoin Miners Eye Nuclear Power as Environmental Criticism Mounts

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Re: Bitcoin Miners Eye Nuclear Power as Environmental Criticism Mounts

#21

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

trident5000 wrote: post #18
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rooftop solar, nuclear, coal, oil, hydro - literally NONE of this matters. The whole thing about proof-of-work is that it serves as a way to prove that a particular miner spent some amount of money (in the form of energy costs) validating a transaction. As the value of Bitcoin increases, then, it means there is more incentive to throw energy at the problem, because the reward you get for mining (or, for that matter,…

The issue really comes down to that some people think its a waste of energy and some people do not. Im in the do not think its a waste camp. And as mentioned above, the hash rate is not an infinite black hole, it levels off as the price levels off regardless of userbase.

> The issue really comes down to that some people think its a waste of energy and some people do not

No, that's not what I'm talking about. I'm making no judgment at all as to whether validating transactions is a good use of energy.

> And as mentioned above, the hash rate is not an infinite black hole, it levels off as the price levels off regardless of userbase.

Exactly, and your statement here 100% proves my point. Since the total number of Bitcoins is fixed, the only 2 options are (1) "the price levels off" as you put it - but the only way (long term) for the price to level off, when supply is restricted, is for demand to eventually wane. The other option (2) is for Bitcoin to eventually become a sizable portion of the financial system, in which case it's energy demands will grow proportionally.

The point I'm trying to emphasize is that Bitcoin backers' position is not possibly consistent: either Bitcoin becomes widely deployed for actually facilitating transactions, in which case its energy use grows proportionally, or its energy use plateaus, in which case it means usage of Bitcoin will have plateaued as well. There is no middle option.

Re: Bitcoin Miners Eye Nuclear Power as Environmental Criticism Mounts

#22

Post by cratermoon »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #20

This argument doesn't make any sense. Electricity is really easy to transmit across the power grid. There is no such thing as an isolated power plant with excess electricity. Any electricity used for Bitcoin is electricity that isn't used to take a coal-fired power plant offline somewhere else.

Given the drastically falling costs of renewable energy, how does the nuclear power hype train continue? Their main justification for it now is that it's clean, compared to fossil fuels. That doesn't account for the greenhouse gas contribution from the mining and processing of uranium, which isn't renewable. More importantly, is there any way it will ever compete on cost? Why choose a clean, non-renewable source that costs more than a clean renewable? What about factoring in the costs of the waste and decommissioning of nuclear power plants?

Re: Bitcoin Miners Eye Nuclear Power as Environmental Criticism Mounts

#24

Post by cratermoon »

imglorp wrote: post #11
Closi wrote: post #2

Because bitcoins are completely decentralised and fungible, there is no real driver to Bitcoin miners paying more for renewable energy, other than the threat of government intervention. I can’t read the full article to see if there is a rebuttal though as it’s behind a paywall.

Global government intervention disincentivizing fossil plants for everyone would be a net positive. And if the miners are subsidizing the sustainable power industry, that would also be a net positive for everyone as the state of the art advances to keep up.

> sustainable power industry

I've not heard that nuclear fission is particularly sustainable. Clean, relative to fossil fuels, yes. But sustainable? Does that word even make sense to use in referring to nuclear power, outside the technical sense of "self-sustaining fission reaction"?

Re: Bitcoin Miners Eye Nuclear Power as Environmental Criticism Mounts

#26

Post by trident5000 »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #21
trident5000 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue really comes down to that some people think its a waste of energy and some people do not. Im in the do not think its a waste camp. And as mentioned above, the hash rate is not an infinite black hole, it levels off as the price levels off regardless of userbase.

> The issue really comes down to that some people think its a waste of energy and some people do not No, that's not what I'm talking about. I'm making no judgment at all as to whether validating transactions is a good use of energy. > And as mentioned above, the hash rate is not an infinite black hole, it levels off as the price levels off regardless of userbase. Exactly , and your statement here 100% proves my point…

> either Bitcoin becomes widely deployed for actually facilitating transactions, in which case its energy use grows proportionally, or its energy use plateaus

Again thats not how it works. Energy usage does not grow in proportion with transactions. It grows in proportion to hash rate which is a function of market capitalization value. I can assure you the MC of bitcoin is not going to grow exponentially infinitely because that is a physical impossibility.

Re: Bitcoin Miners Eye Nuclear Power as Environmental Criticism Mounts

#27

Post by mistrial9 »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #17
trident5000 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think thats a pretty big assumption. What about rooftop solar?...if excess energy was used to mine btc. You would have incentive for solar adoption and the most fair and distributed system possible. Not saying this is how it goes but there's possibilities out there that can make sense. Also has anyone actually looked at the btc energy usage as a percentage of global energy usage? Its a pimple and that rate does not…

Rooftop solar, nuclear, coal, oil, hydro - literally NONE of this matters. The whole thing about proof-of-work is that it serves as a way to prove that a particular miner spent some amount of money (in the form of energy costs) validating a transaction. As the value of Bitcoin increases, then, it means there is more incentive to throw energy at the problem, because the reward you get for mining (or, for that matter,…

> Rooftop solar, nuclear, coal, oil, hydro - literally NONE of this matters

.. as long as the Carbon-centric economy grows, food-miles continue, the high-end leisure hotel market gets subsidy and wasteful wars continue to literally kill and maim as well as use yet more fossil fuel, yes, agree.. none of that matters

meanwhile, viva crypto

Re: Bitcoin Miners Eye Nuclear Power as Environmental Criticism Mounts

#28

Post by Manuel_D »

cratermoon wrote: post #22
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #20

This argument doesn't make any sense. Electricity is really easy to transmit across the power grid. There is no such thing as an isolated power plant with excess electricity. Any electricity used for Bitcoin is electricity that isn't used to take a coal-fired power plant offline somewhere else.

Given the drastically falling costs of renewable energy, how does the nuclear power hype train continue? Their main justification for it now is that it's clean, compared to fossil fuels. That doesn't account for the greenhouse gas contribution from the mining and processing of uranium, which isn't renewable . More importantly, is there any way it will ever compete on cost? Why choose a clean, non-renewable source tha…

You also have to extract copper and steel to build wind farms, and drive trucks to install solar panels. The net greenhouse gas emissions from nuclear is at most equal to, and likely less than other renewables: https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2018/02/ipcc_wg3_ar5...

Not to mention, there's enough accessible uranium to make concerns about the being "renewable" moot: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2016/07/01/uranium-s...

And the huge win provided by nuclear power is it's geographic independence and consistent output. Nuclear plants work regardless of wind speed, and give the same output in the Arctic circle as they do at the equator. And this output is consistent, it doesn't fluctuate with weather or day/night cycles. This eliminates the need for storage, which is something we don't currently have the capability to build at any substantial scale.

That's what people don't realize when they compare costs of nuclear vs solar + wind. The reality is it's costs of nuclear vs. costs of solar + wind + thousands of miles of HVDC lines to move energy from rural areas to population centers + massive amounts of grid storage to accommodate intermittent generation.

Re: Bitcoin Miners Eye Nuclear Power as Environmental Criticism Mounts

#29

Post by freeflight »

trident5000 wrote: post #18
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rooftop solar, nuclear, coal, oil, hydro - literally NONE of this matters. The whole thing about proof-of-work is that it serves as a way to prove that a particular miner spent some amount of money (in the form of energy costs) validating a transaction. As the value of Bitcoin increases, then, it means there is more incentive to throw energy at the problem, because the reward you get for mining (or, for that matter,…

The issue really comes down to that some people think its a waste of energy and some people do not. Im in the do not think its a waste camp. And as mentioned above, the hash rate is not an infinite black hole, it levels off as the price levels off regardless of userbase.

> The issue really comes down to that some people think its a waste of energy and some people do not.

That's not the only issue, another is how BC did not really deliver on what it originally promised.

Instead, the whole cryptomarket seems to have simply turned a massive speculative market with more manipulation going on than any other financial market.

So all these high and noble goals crypto originally started out on, have turned into a whole bunch of people just trying to make the largest profits, even if that means defrauding a whole bunch of people of their savings.

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