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Just 137 crypto miners use 2.3% of total U.S. power

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Re: Just 137 crypto miners use 2.3% of total U.S. power

#61

Post by jstanley »

triceratops wrote: post #42
015a wrote: post #28

The crypto industry financed a 2.3% expansion of the US's power generating capacity. I don't care what we're spending energy on. Being stingy about it just makes all of us poorer. There's a quadrillion-cubic-kilometer flaming ball of plasma in the sky. We have the ability to generate literally infinite electricity; and quite literally the only way we get to that is by increasing the amount of electricity we're using,…

Does it work like that? Why do utilities encourage customers to become more efficient when they could sell more power and make more money instead? And even if it's true, an expansion of generation capacity is only useful if it's eventually freed up for non-crypto uses, right? Otherwise it's just a wash.

> Why do utilities encourage customers to become more efficient when they could sell more power and make more money instead?

Because that kind of marketing works on a lot of people.

Re: Just 137 crypto miners use 2.3% of total U.S. power

#62

Post by Bitbitcowurgh »

jonathan-adly wrote: post #38

Power usage by itself is meaningless. The real question is the power providing utility or not. Like, no one thinks data centers for AWS are bad. They provide real benefit and utility. But, perhaps power wasted on cloth dryers and Christmas lights are a western frivolity. So, the real argument is Bitcoin useful or not. Which, like most things, is something that probably be left to the free market.

Lucky enough, we are not living in a free market.

Otherwise we would all be fucked.

Just in case you don't get it: have you ever seen a company making a high quality, sustainable and save product because of free market? Nope they do it because of laws we as a society make.

And in this particular case, i'm absolutly for banning it globally.

Re: Just 137 crypto miners use 2.3% of total U.S. power

#63

Post by Night_Thastus »

Y_Y wrote: post #44
gipp wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah those companies generally use that energy to produce things of value to people

The cryptocurrency has value! Maybe we agree that it's shitty, but its value is abundantly clear. It has a price and a nonzero trading volume. An economy that prioritized at human wellbeing or moral value (and had the might to impose it) might be nice, but it's a far cry from the current reality of market forces determining what gets produced.

That 'value' effectively doesn't exist. Basically no-one is going out and buying things with Crypto, minus some illegal purchases.

The only reason people are still involved with it at all is as a speculative asset. They aren't using it as a currency - they're hoping it will go up in price and they can pawn it off to the next sucker to do the same. That's not 'value' in my eyes.

Re: Just 137 crypto miners use 2.3% of total U.S. power

#64

Post by triceratops »

jstanley wrote: post #61
triceratops wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does it work like that? Why do utilities encourage customers to become more efficient when they could sell more power and make more money instead? And even if it's true, an expansion of generation capacity is only useful if it's eventually freed up for non-crypto uses, right? Otherwise it's just a wash.

> Why do utilities encourage customers to become more efficient when they could sell more power and make more money instead? Because that kind of marketing works on a lot of people.

To accomplish what end? Why are they marketing efficiency?

Re: Just 137 crypto miners use 2.3% of total U.S. power

#65

Post by jkubicek »

jonathan-adly wrote: post #38

Power usage by itself is meaningless. The real question is the power providing utility or not. Like, no one thinks data centers for AWS are bad. They provide real benefit and utility. But, perhaps power wasted on cloth dryers and Christmas lights are a western frivolity. So, the real argument is Bitcoin useful or not. Which, like most things, is something that probably be left to the free market.

> Which, like most things, is something that probably be left to the free market.

Except Bitcoin mining is a perfect example of why these things should NOT be left to the free market.

Re: Just 137 crypto miners use 2.3% of total U.S. power

#66

Post by bdcravens »

jonathan-adly wrote: post #38

Power usage by itself is meaningless. The real question is the power providing utility or not. Like, no one thinks data centers for AWS are bad. They provide real benefit and utility. But, perhaps power wasted on cloth dryers and Christmas lights are a western frivolity. So, the real argument is Bitcoin useful or not. Which, like most things, is something that probably be left to the free market.

> Which, like most things, is something that probably be left to the free market.

The free market is often at odds with society at large, which is why we have regulations to protect society from the free market.

Re: Just 137 crypto miners use 2.3% of total U.S. power

#68

Post by keyringlight »

Retric wrote: post #39
015a wrote: post #28

The crypto industry financed a 2.3% expansion of the US's power generating capacity. I don't care what we're spending energy on. Being stingy about it just makes all of us poorer. There's a quadrillion-cubic-kilometer flaming ball of plasma in the sky. We have the ability to generate literally infinite electricity; and quite literally the only way we get to that is by increasing the amount of electricity we're using,…

This 2.3% mostly came from fossil fuels not new green generation capacity. You need to consider where these miners are located based on electricity costs and what infrastructure is built there not simply a hypothetical grid where arbitrary power can be moved anywhere at zero losses.

Yes, it's hard to get much distance out of that logic. If that was the case there'd be little reasoning for efficiency as incandescent lightbulbs would also be incentive to expand power generation. It delays turning off dirtier generation even if more modern and efficient plants get built.
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