Bitcoin mining uses a lot of energy so will Bitcoin become eco-friendly? Mining Bitcoin uses around 50 terawatt hours per year, approximately 0.25% of the world all electricity consumption. According to Digiconomist, it also produces carbon dioxide at 966 kg / megawatt hour (4913 lb/megawatt hour). The number of people investing in bitcoin is increasing every day, with some companies even paying salaries via cryptocurrencies. Bitcoin is here to stay so we need to know if it is ever likely to be ecofriendly.
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Bitcoin Background
The factors that have encouraged bitcoin investment are the digital currency’s security and decentralized nature. It provides a way to transfer money since transactions do not need to go through a bank or government treasury department due to its peer-to-peer system which allows people from all over the world to exchange bitcoin for fiat currencies including Dollars, Yen and Euros .
However, bitcoin mining has reached an unsustainable level where the energy needed exceeds the bitcoin price, making bitcoin mining less profitable – even though bitcoin’s value has shown a tremendous increase. And if bitcoin miners are not earning enough money to cover their electricity cost because the bitcoin price has dropped, then bitcoin will become eco-unfriendly until its value recovers.
Why bitcoin is not eco friendly?
Bitcoin’s electricity consumption has been steadily rising for years now and there is public concern over the environmental effects.
The bitcoin network consumes vast quantities of energy: it is estimated that bitcoin mining uses 0.13% of global electricity – this would rank #23 in terms of individual countries using most energy. The bitcoin network is estimated to use enough electricity in a year to power almost 3 million American homes . bitcoin mining farms are known to spring up around areas with low-cost electricity, like China and Canada; though Bitcoin demand has significantly affected the price of electricity within bitcoin ‘farms’ as well. China has since banned crypto mining
Currently, bitcoin can be mined using either high-end processors or ‘mining rigs’, which are specifically made for bitcoin mining; though bitcoin miners are on the hunt for faster processing speeds and so rely increasingly on graphics cards (GPUs) , which also require a lot of energy consumption.
When bitcoin was first introduced it could be mined by computer CPUs , before the introduction of bitcoin-specific integrated circuits that were 50 to 100 times faster than CPU’s. Then, GPUs outperformed CPUs in bitcoin mining, with an increase of 50 times in bitcoin mining power per unit compared to CPU’s; this was due to their very high parallel processing capabilities. Now bitcoin mining is done by specially-designed ASICs (application-specific integrated circuits), which are almost exclusively made by Chinese manufacturers. Bitcoin’s increasing price has driven the demand of bitcoin miners up, resulting in an increase in demand for more efficient bitcoin miners like ASICs .
This combination of circumstances affects bitcoin’s energy consumption: the amount of electricity required per unit of work conducted on the bitcoin network rises due to both its higher hash rate (a measure of processing power) and its increasing difficulty , which require more computational effort.
How does bitcoin affect the environment?
originally bitcoin was running on low energy but more and more bitcoin mining farms are being set up around the world. these bitcoin mining farms have a lot of power and a bitcoin mine just in Iceland is using more electricity than most countries!
The bitcoin network uses about ten terawatt hours of energy annually. that is twice as much as it takes to run Google’s data centres.
bitcoin was meant to be an alternative currency to pay for things online but it is becoming more and more expensive so fewer people are using bitcoin which means that bitcoin is not suitable in its current form to become an ecologically friendly system.
Bitcoin mining farms
Bitcoin mining farms are bitcoin mines that have thousands of miners which mine bitcoin 24 h a day, 7 days a week! these bitcoin mines use so much power and the electricity they use is more than most countries in the world! this enormous amount of energy is used to generate new bitcoins using computer hardware! according to some sources bitcoin mining farms could easily be banned around the globe because their massive energy consumption could lead to blackouts for countries where lots of these bitcoin mines are located!
Every 10 minutes on average 15 new bitcoin are created every block mined. this means that bitcoin miners generate 60 bitcoin per hour and 1,800 bitcoin per day!
For bitcoin to become eco-friendly bitcoin mining farms need to be shut down just like gold mines which use too much energy ! very few bitcoin mining farms would remain and those who do stay must find a way to keep bitcoin eco-friendly if they want bitcoin to become an ecosytem for alternative payments.
Eco friendly alternatives to Bitcoin
Is there an eco friendly version of Bitcoin?
Final thoughts:
We can say that bitcoin is not currently ecologically friendly because it needs so much energy and the power consumption of the bitcoin network is more than most countries! this does not mean that bitcoin cannot be eco-friendly but if bitcoin continues as it is now then there will be lots of victims from people who have to spend a lot of money for bitcoin mining farms which cost too much energy ! bitcoin is currently not an eco-friendly system and bitcoin needs to change its self before bitcoin can become eco-friendly.
so bitcoin has been built as a decentralised currency which you cannot regulate so it is not possible for bitcoin to become eco friendly unless bitcoin changes completely.
Addtional Facts
The power consumption of bitcoin is more than most countries!
If bitcoin mining continues, then lots of electricity will be used and we could see blackouts around the world because of all the power that would be needed!
