Earlier quoted context omitted.
>The correct comparison would be to compare the cost of Bitcoin to U.S. dollars or gold. Gold requires hundreds of dollars per ounce and untold energy to extract. U.S. dollars require the existence of a powerful economy and trillion dollar military to keep the currency secure and desirable. No it isn't- the energy cost of bitcoin is ongoing and depends on the volume of transactions. Each time money changes hands, it…
If read the article correctly, he's including the cost of mining Bitcoin, not merely energy cost to verify a coin (which is absolutely trivial). Once all Bitcoin is mined (yes, there's a built-in maximum), or it becomes prohibitively expensive to mine, there won't be any mining costs. You can look at the current Bitcoin energy costs as the startup cost to establish a new gold mine or a new country with its own curren…
If mining becomes less profitable, fewer people will mine and the proof-of-work will tune to be less difficult, but the cost never disappears and there's still a huge amount of energy wasted in the selection process for adding blocks. If too few people mine the currency will be totally destabilized.