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Bitcoin consumed 134 TWh in total during 2021

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Re: Bitcoin consumed 134 TWh in total during 2021

#101

Post by epolanski »

londons_explore wrote: post #83

It's worth remembering that these figures are calculated based on the efficiency of known bitcoin miners. However, I believe it is likely that a good chunk of bitcoin mining is done on privately designed, owned, and run machines which are likely to be substantially more efficient. Since the main cost of bitcoin mining is electricity, anyone who can design a more efficient miner has an incentive to keep that design to…

I actually think the very opposite, that massive amounts are mined with very old and inefficient hardware, while those calculations seem to always over represent more modern and efficient miners.

Re: Bitcoin consumed 134 TWh in total during 2021

#102

Post by hihihihi1234 »

cryptica wrote: post #92

I like cryptocurrencies but this high electricity usage has kept me away from Bitcoin in the early days. I've since come to forgive Bitcoin for this ridiculous energy usage because of how important a problem Bitcoin is solving (the world desperately needs provably scarce, deflationary hard money). It's just unfortunate that people chose to focus on Bitcoin and not some other PoS crypto which uses less electricity...…

Why does the world need deflationary money?

Re: Bitcoin consumed 134 TWh in total during 2021

#103

Post by thathndude »

Nextgrid wrote: post #56

The only way to beat Bitcoin or other proof-of-work cryptocurrencies is to remove the need for them. Bitcoin and other cryptos have a use-case; it may not be apparent to someone living in a developed country with access to a good banking system or it may be one you don't like and involves criminal activity, but there absolutely is a use-case. The only way to stop this is if the traditional banking system catches up a…

We know that technological history is full of situations where the inferior technology prevailed for some reason or another. The classic example is Betamax versus VHS.

All that is to say, as much as I’d like to believe it is true, there is some naivety to suggest that a superior solution will simply up end cryptocurrency, when there is a lot of money to be made by a lot of very wealthy people in cryptocurrency.

Re: Bitcoin consumed 134 TWh in total during 2021

#104

Post by thathndude »

SavantIdiot wrote: post #81
Nextgrid wrote: post #56

The only way to beat Bitcoin or other proof-of-work cryptocurrencies is to remove the need for them. Bitcoin and other cryptos have a use-case; it may not be apparent to someone living in a developed country with access to a good banking system or it may be one you don't like and involves criminal activity, but there absolutely is a use-case. The only way to stop this is if the traditional banking system catches up a…

How do you legalize money laundering?

I lol’d. thank you for this

Re: Bitcoin consumed 134 TWh in total during 2021

#105

Post by [deleted] »

sktrdie wrote: post #7

With a climate crisis the last thing we needed was to make the most effective energy consumption system ever constructed. The whole thing literally works on competing on consuming more energy. No other system works so efficiently towards such goal. What's scary is that the whole thing was designed to be unstoppable. My utopian hope for the future is that we start sending rigs in orbit close to the sun. Since we only…

[deleted]

Re: Bitcoin consumed 134 TWh in total during 2021

#106

Post by bparsons »

mwattsun wrote: post #25

The counter argument is that Bitcoin is a battery [1] so that if you live in a place like Iceland with plentiful energy, so much that even exporting it as aluminum leaves extra, then you can turn it into Bitcoin and export it that way. But most Bitcoin mining is not that. I feel like Joni Mitchell in the Big Yellow Taxi: "They paved paradise and put up a parking lot" [2] Why are we allowing this to happen? (Well, at…

How do I power my house with a JPEG of an ape?

Re: Bitcoin consumed 134 TWh in total during 2021

#107

Post by chillacy »

thathndude wrote: post #55
sktrdie wrote: post #7

With a climate crisis the last thing we needed was to make the most effective energy consumption system ever constructed. The whole thing literally works on competing on consuming more energy. No other system works so efficiently towards such goal. What's scary is that the whole thing was designed to be unstoppable. My utopian hope for the future is that we start sending rigs in orbit close to the sun. Since we only…

I have a son who is just about 10 years old, and he’s getting to the age where he’s beginning to realize how irrational our world is. We recently had a conversation discussing the fact that we could eradicate hunger and the need for clean water globally, but for a whole host of reasons we have not yet done it. He continues to probe “why“ and all I can say is, essentially, because people are greedy and unmotivated gen…

Adam smith wrote a short philosophy book about this back in the day about this very topic. (something like: what is worse: stubbing your toe, or a natural disaster somewhere remote which kills thousands but doesn’t affect you personally).

I wouldn’t say it’s “the answer” but it is “a candidate answer”

Re: Bitcoin consumed 134 TWh in total during 2021

#108

Post by thathndude »

epolanski wrote: post #88
hsavit1 wrote: post #28

We are rapidly depleting our remaining carbon budget. Can a bitcoiner please explain to me why this is a necessary technological development right now?

"technological development". Don't we already have plenty of more efficient coins out there?

I’ve never understood the BTC purists. I’m generally anti-crypto in any variety, but As far as cryptocurrency‘s go, bitcoin is really bad compared to so many alternatives.

I’d just as soon see it all go up in smoke. But why does BTC reign?

Re: Bitcoin consumed 134 TWh in total during 2021

#109

Post by meribold »

mwattsun wrote: post #79
smnrchrds wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing about battery is that you can take the energy out of it. It stores energy. That's the entire point of a battery. How on earth can you do that with Bitcoin? If you can't, Bitcoin isn't a battery, it's a black hole.

Ideally, you would mine your Bitcoin in Iceland or Chile [1] with geothermal or hydro and buy corn from Iowa with it and the farmers there use it to buy power from the local windmill grid, so it's a battery in that sense. [1] https://www.hydropower.org/country-profiles/chile

It's a battery in the sense that you can use it to buy electricity?

Re: Bitcoin consumed 134 TWh in total during 2021

#110

Post by dghlsakjg »

clippablematt wrote: post #78
robomartin wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Blockchain is the single largest threat to banking, and that doesn’t come without a price. That's an interesting statement. The first question that occurred to me was: Why does banking have to be threatened? In other words, is this a solution looking for a problem?

I feel like lots of people forgot about 2007/08 and the impact on so many people around the world. It was truly painful and destructive. And very clearly people responsible got off free, with bonuses and some even ended up with jobs in the treasury. A lot of people I know working in crypto saw their families hurt badly by that crises and will happily spend their lives trying to build something else (even if the odds…

Serious question: how would cryptocurrencies and defi have helped avoid/mitigate the subprime lending crisis specifically?
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