I think arguments about electricity consumption of Bitcoin are purely a waste of energy.<p>I know of zero people who used to like Bitcoin but are turned off by energy consumption. Bitcoin has the potential to make huge portions of the finance industry obsolete: how much energy does the finance industry as a whole use? How do we make a valid comparison? Does anyone have an amount of power consumption reduction that they think would make Bitcoin use justified for the functionality it provides?<p>The only time I see people arguing against Bitcoin based on power consumption, it seems like the speaker already had a distaste for Bitcoin and latched onto the power consumption argument because it's easy to state and you don't have to understand the technology or economics to use the argument. There is no call to action or suggestion, it's just "See? Bitcoin is bad." I see it as just a method to mollify the insecurities and regret from not recognizing that Bitcoin was going to be valuable back when they first heard about it.<p>If you saw a website that showed the power consumption of all internet services, would you find that to be a compelling reason to change the way you interact with the internet?
I found it interesting also to look at kwh per transaction. Several places claim that in early 2020 bitcoin used ~700kwh per transaction (<a href="https://www.statista.com/statistics/881541/bitcoin-energy-consumption-transaction-comparison-visa/" rel="nofollow">https://www.statista.com/statistics/881541/bitcoin-energy-co...</a>), and this equates to about 2700 miles of driving a Tesla Model 3 at the rated consumption of 257wh/mi which is plain a ton (and also is about 1 month of solar production from my house's rooftop solar). With Tesla now accepting bitcoin, this means you can add ~2.7k miles of emissions to the car without even driving it, and probably even more since they have to move the money afterwards.
Edit: Don't forget about ewaste also. Some quick math and assuming a 2 year lifetime says that each miner can contribute 10-20 transactions. This is why I think proof of stake is a better way to go.
So, you think there will be another bubble, before Bitcoin goes out of fashion for climate reasons?<p>I think there is definitely a future for crypto, but surely there isn't for Bitcoin.
If you price carbon for energy production, all industries are incentivised to move clean. Bitcoin miners would love it. This argument is a complete red herring.
As long as it's green power, who cares how much gets used?<p>If we could put miniature 1 GW power plants in every home that were 100% renewable and didn't pollute, we would.