http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-12-12/bi...tricity/9246888
It's been assessed that the mining of the limit of 1,800 bitcoins per month is using electricity equivalent to the energy consumption of New Zealand.
Yes, that's tiny...but meaningless calculations to "do the work" required to gain a bitcoin mean that currently the energy consumption is that of a modern country.
Read one economist who said that it's not a runaway catastrophe, the price of energy will stabilise the bitcoin price.
For reference, 150MWh on a 40% efficient plant is about 145,000 lb of coal.
In a way the bitcoin "mining" is akin to having the hole digging gangs digging holes and filling them back up...effort for the sake of doing it.
Years ago I used to donate spare processing capacity to SETI and Cancer research...at least using that sort of process for bitcoin payment makes some sense.
It's been assessed that the mining of the limit of 1,800 bitcoins per month is using electricity equivalent to the energy consumption of New Zealand.
Yes, that's tiny...but meaningless calculations to "do the work" required to gain a bitcoin mean that currently the energy consumption is that of a modern country.
Read one economist who said that it's not a runaway catastrophe, the price of energy will stabilise the bitcoin price.
For reference, 150MWh on a 40% efficient plant is about 145,000 lb of coal.
In a way the bitcoin "mining" is akin to having the hole digging gangs digging holes and filling them back up...effort for the sake of doing it.
Years ago I used to donate spare processing capacity to SETI and Cancer research...at least using that sort of process for bitcoin payment makes some sense.