Bitcoin Forum

New york city used 5GW of electricity in 2001

With bitcoin mining, lets assume 1W/GH of power is required, per hour.

That means 8000KW is required for 8000TH/S network hash rate, per hour.

Now lets assume difficulty doubles every month, as it has been.

8000KW (present)
16000KW (in 2 months)
32000KW (in 3 months)
64000KW (in 4 months)
128000KW (in 5 months)
256000KW (in 6 months)
512000KW (in 7 months)
1GW (in 8 months)
2GW (in 9 months)
4GW (in 10 months)
8GW (in 11 months)
16GW (in 12 months)
32GW (in 13 months)
64GW (in 14 months)

So in 14 months, we would see more power consumption than New york city ANNUALLY in a single hour of bitcoin mining

Obviously the wattage will become more efficient as we build better miners, but there is no way it can keep up.  You would have to see a 2x efficiency improvement every month... and we have not seen that.  But even if you slow down my numbers to account for that, it would still happen in less than a decade.

Eventually the entire world will double its power consumption because of Bitcoin.. and then triple it...

 I am pretty confident we are FUCKED, gentlemen.   ;D

 :D

Things that come to my mind:
1) Difficulty varies and can go down if needed.
2) If you want to reduce mining costs just turn off the lights. People lose so much just by leaving lights on outside their houses for the night ( like porch, pool, house number).
3) If btc price continues to rise we can all afford paying more. Electric companies will earn more and upgrade their networks, we earn more from mining, win - win.

I don't think it will get to that point. You're assuming it will continue to be profitable to mine Bitcoin all throughout that time. Which it won't. Now, that's not to say that people won't use their computer power to mine other stuff instead. Maybe we are doomed LOL.

1)Difficulty will not go down.  Supply and demand drives the difficulty upwards.  

2) My cointerra machine will need a dedicated circuit in my house.  Leaving the lights on in my house does not use up 1500W an hour.  We are talking massive power here when you're looking at the entire network.  Not even comparable to lights, because light usage does not grow at such an exponential rate.  

3) You're talking cost.  I'm talking depletion of energy resources.  If you think the electric companies can handle a 2X increase in power requirements in 1 month when they already become strained from the system, you're nuts.  

If bitcoin keeps going up, it will continue to be profitable to mine

People just won't be minning, cuz electricity will be cost more than btc mined ;/

but then bitcoin goes up, and it becomes profitable again

So the only problem is power company being able to support the demand? With the electric cars becoming more popular and people using tripple crossfire setups for gaming they will have to come up with something even if btc goes to the bottom.  Demand for electricity is rising anyway - do you know how much facebook data center is using?

I read about a big solar plant opening few weeks ago. No worries!

I don't think you guys understand what 2X/month means.  Imagine facebooks data center power requirements doubling every month.. eventually they would need to harness their energy from other galaxies  ::)

In not so far future, bitcoin heater will be installed globally in every house in northern countries  ;)

Shit, i think i should build a power plant.

It's a simple demand/supply quiz. If electricity usage goes up, so does the price.
Then miners will have the incentives to find cheaper sources, like solar power.
That will boost the development in the southern countries.
Everyone wins! 

Solar power isn't cheap.
You need the space and the materials to build it.
Okay, so we determine we only need the entire Nevada desert to supply the mining requirements with solar power..
but what about the month after?  We will need twice the room
And the month after that, we'll need 4 times the room..

See what I'm saying?  It's the doubling that fucks us  :D  eventually the entire sun will not be able to keep up with the mining growth

Bitcoin can't go up forever.
Also there will be lot's of improvements in energy consumptions for asic devices but that's just secondary.

The free market will solve this :).

We've got Africa, Central America and Asia, so for the near future we're covered.
When BTC price hits 1mln then space stations will be built to better utilize the lights of other galaxies. :)

i thought all the ASIC miners were low wattage devices

1W for 1GH as per OP is the lowest IMO

So , let;s assume we have 8000TH , that's 4000 Cointerras

8000KW (present)           need to add another 4000
16000KW (in 2 months)    8000
32000KW (in 3 months)    16000
64000KW (in 4 months)    32000
128000KW (in 5 months)   64000
256000KW (in 6 months)   128000
512000KW (in 7 months)   256000
1GW (in 8 months)        512000
2GW (in 9 months)       1024000
4GW (in 10 months)      2M
8GW (in 11 months)      4M
16GW (in 12 months)     8M
32GW (in 13 months)     16M
64GW (in 14 months)     32M

So , in one month we'll have to produce 32 millions cointerra miners or equivalent.
I see a problem here. Cause that's the amount of Iphones Apple sells in 4 months.

1w/gh is low wattage compared to old GPU/CPU mining..
and so what if it wasn't?  If it was 0.25w/gh, that will only delay this scenerio for 4 months..

many will just unplug their miners if it is unprofittable or too costly. this will bring power consumption down. the infrastructure will still function but will be exclusive to those with free electric/solar.

yes obviously it's not possible to double forever.. eventually we will either run out of energy or material.  Either way it's not good..

I'm a bit tired but let's give it a try:
8000 kw should be 19 000 usd.  nice cost /block reward
8MW/20000 USD , that would lead to  64GW 160 millions cost/ day. Well , just to cover the cost 1 bitcoin should be worth 50 000. And this if forgetting about the cost of equipment.
And the halving in the next years.

I don't see a problem with electricity cost at all.

Again , maybe I made a mistake with the cost but still...

Die-shrink of chips also brings better power efficiency. So it won't be doubled constantly.

64GW/hour.. not day..
and even if there is no problem, what about when its 128GW, then 256GW, then 512GW??
don't stop there..

So if we increase the power efficiency by 8x, then that delays this scenerio by 4 months..
like i said, our efficiency has not been keeping up with the growth

Assuming the ridiculous assumption that it were possible for difficulty to keep climbing like it is, eventually the power companies would have to charge more for power. They'd be able to justify the increase with expenses for added capacity.

Maybe bitcoin will force the upgrade our US electrical grid apparently needs.


 ;D

Yeah , 64GW/hour will end up costing you 160millions daily.
If we have a consumption of 512GW it's gonna be 1280 millions , 1.2 billion.

Let's watch the picture in a few years , block reward halved twice. The reward is only 1000 day.  one bitcoin should be worth 1 million dollars to sustain only the electricity cost  and almost 2.5 millions to cover the expenses with the equipment.

You see now the problem with this ?

bitcoin mining will become illegal in most countries because of ridiculous waste of resources and power
and this post will be part of the history books
thank you
 ;D

So let me get this right:

If more people mine bitcoins difficulty increases and thus energy consumption.

If energy consumption increases due to more people mining without a price increase, people will stop mining.

Thus, you are assuming that the price continues to go up to justify this energy consumption, which it wont.

.. in the section , worst predictions ever?
http://shareranks.com/499,The-Worst-Predictions-Ever
Pick your place

people won't stop mining though if the bitcoin price keeps going up.

if we see a $100,000 bitcoin, we're in big trouble with everybody raping energy resources to mine

Lol, good point. This will not be happening.

So your scenario assumes, a $ 100.000 price tag. LOL.

If energy costs are unsustainable, so is Bitcoin. Thus we would never see this price.
 

I believe we would run out of resources before finding out that it is "unsustainable"

Few years later:
Top voted worst prediction ever by VolanicEruptor, a bitcointalk forum user, December 2013.  ;D

Give it a few years.  You'll see..

You know , since the amount of bitcoins per block , mined as a reward will be halving , time is not quite your ally.

LOL. If your energy cost assumptions are correct, bitcoins price will collapse, as market participants will realize that the system is unsustainable.

Its absurd to imply, that you are the only one who would figure this out.

what do you call a collapse though?  from $100,000 down to $10,000?   :D

Where did $10,000 come from, or $100,000 for that matter? You do realize there is no guarantee bitcoin is to continue increasing in value, right? Likewise there is no reason bitcoin can't be successful without being $100,000?

If you are correct, and Bitcoin is not scale-able due to exploding energy costs, cryptocurrency fans will move to a new coin. Bitcoin would collapse to 0, if you are correct.

 

If electricity becomes too expensive to mine, people will stop mining, and the network hash rate will stabilize or drop. People won't mine to lose money ..... oops, my bad, most do that already  ;)

You do not know how supply and demand works.

???

Your assumption: 1) Bitcoin is not scale-able, due to energy costs exploding. 2) Nobody will notice and price will continue going up 3) Armageddon

Assumption 2) is off base. Market participants would notice, and price would collapse. Cryptofans would move to a sustainable coin.

 

nope.  it's not just a matter of "noticing and then getting out".  That's not how long-term system failure works. 

So market participants dont understand exponential energy cost explosions??? Like sheep they would continue to bid the price up and run over the edge of a cliff. So you are saying you would be the only one wise enough to see, that the system is not sustainable.

Lol. Pure arrogance.

If difficulty keeps doubling for the next 14 months i think the price will be through the roof. So we are not exactly fucked  :P

You made another false assumption.. i never said that

it will be very nice for people who own bitcoin, yes
but there is a whole world outside of bitcoin

What exactly are you saying?

Your title: Bitcoin Armageddon.

How?

Read the first post.  :)

LOL. You are filibustering.

1)
2) + 3)



Your assumptions: 1) Energy consumption is unsustainable 2) Despite this being the case, people will continue to bid the price up. 3) Armageddon.

What assumption am I misrepresenting?

this assumption: "So market participants dont understand exponential energy cost explosions??? Like sheep they would continue to bid the price up and run over the edge of a cliff. So you are saying you would be the only one wise enough to see, that the system is not sustainable."

it's just wrong because I never said that

You are implying this with continued price increase despite the system being unsustainable:

no, I never implied this.  You made the assumption yourself.  The timeline is not black and white.  It is a long, gradual process in which our resources are used up at an exponentially rapid rate.  No big concepts to grab, pretty simple..

when's the last coin being mined? Think of all the energy surplus then ....  :)

At least , he still has some energy left to troll around.
I wouldn't bother with him anymore.

The all the plants will close down , lots of jobs lost , factories producing equipment closed down , BTC collapses , and we end up wondering , why the hell did we spend 100 years doing puzzles ? =))))))))))))

YES YOU DID.


Why would the price keep going up, if the system is unstainable.

You are implying that market participants BUY DESPITE THE SYTEM BEING UNSUSTAINABLE.

Thus they must be STUPID.

You are implying that market participants ARE MORONS.

But by that time there will around 5 million altcoins that need feeding ..... now even I'm getting scared. I'd rather have power to my computer and TV than have it all sent to mining farms.

I would never imply that the market participants are morons.  Not at all.  We all want a piece of this wonderful boom.  
The system does not "appear completely sustainable" one day, and not the next
it is rather a long and drawn out process.  You just need to think outside the box a little.  :)

Either it is sustainable or it is not.

If you are correct, and it is not sustainable, the price must collapse.

Now you saying that a unsustainable system BOOMS is absurd.

 Popcorn time

Me no understand ur english.  Come again?
This is not absurd, it is just simple acknowledgement that difficulty is going up faster than our resources can handle it.  :)  

The bolded part is you stating that Bitcoin is not SCALABLE.

You STATING THAT A SYSTEM THAT IS NOT SCALABLE WILL CONTINUE TO SCALE IS ABSURD.

MARKET PARTICIPANTS WOULD FIGURE OUT THAT THEY ARE RUNNING TOWARDS THE EDGE OF A CLIFF.

END OF DISCUSSION.

I've warned you to stop trying to convince him of actual facts.
This is what you get for feeding a troll.

It seems that you don't have much experience with communicating on the internet.  Please do not talk in capslock, it sounds like you are yelling and most people will point this out to you rather quick.  It's best to just relax a little bit before you post.  Yelling in capslock is also a very clear sign that you are frustrated with the fact you lost an argument.  Maybe go for a walk, clear your head and come back with a clean perspective.  I would suggest a warm cup of tea..

Another filibuster. You are a troll. Your assumptions are absurd and you have not addressed my point.

Bye.

Every sane person that would have tried to argue with you would have ended up yelling since you keep saying the same stuff and you don't even look like listening to arguments.

Porc calling someone a troll. Classic :))))))))))))

I addressed your point with my point, please go back and read the posts :)

I hope porc gets to sleep tonight.  It must feel terrible to be so wrong about something  :D

He's having that cup of tea you suggested. I fear he'll be back .... he's like a troll with a hobbit unfortunately.

I 'm not sure what you mean exactly. After all it's not like miners will to take away electricity from the rest of the world just to power their machines  ::)

Ummm ..... electricity is a finite resource unfortunately, and a very expensive one. Countries / cities do go through stages where they have power outages because supply can't meet demand. Will be interesting in the future if bitcoin miners really do start taking up a significant % of any countries / cities supply whether they will be any fallout. Sounds unlikely but those bitcoin farms are getting pretty industrial now.

But since we will shut down all banks , the energy consumption will go down a little , right :))) ?

remind me to bump this thread in 5 years.

Luckily your numbers seem to be off though.

In 2007 New York used 65,591GWh of electricity.
http://observer.com/2008/04/new-york-city-reaches-for-the-sun-but-for-now-were-not-even-close/

For the sake of simplicity, let's assume the Bitcoin network is currently running at 1W/GH/s @ 8,000,000 GH/s.
So per hour the Bitcoin network uses 8,000kWh * 24 * 365 = 70,080GWh of electricity per year.

That's a bit more than New York in 2007, but less than 0.4% of the global electricity consumption of the whole world in 2002. Not accounting for variation, this would make miners responsible for 0.4% of electricity used in their respective country, based on numbers from 2002 (it's fairly safe to assume that global energy consumption has grown since then).
(19,320,360 GWh per year according to Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_electricity_consumption

Of course the argument still stands that the higher the BTC price, the higher the electricity consumption of the Bitcoin network because miners are able to spent more money on electricity and still make a profit. So if we would reach 100,000 USD / BTC at the current coin release rate we'd probably be fucked. However I don't see this anytime soon and due to regular block halving, higher prices become more and more sustainable without miners pumping more and more electricity into the network.


Also, at 100,000 USD most Bitcoiners or long time miners would probably be able to built their own solar plants, thus fostering the renewable energy sector and making the world a better place once more :P

As Bitcoin grows (in terms of both hashing power and value), bitcoiners should be able to afford a personal ECAT.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_Catalyzer
http://ecat.com/

Isn't there like a big useless desert in North Africa? The Sahara? Just fill it with solar panels completely.

Exactly this is the reason why I believe the difficulty will stop growing exponentially for a while, because the amount of ASICs they'd need to sell for the difficulty to rise that much is unrealisticly high.

but what will you do the month after?

I don't think that the desert is the best place for solar panels. I mean the environment there is very hostile and the landscape changes constantly.

5 pages? Really?

The word is equilibrium.

if equilibrium applied to us that would be great
unfortunately humans are the biggest shit disturbers the world has ever seen.  We destroy balance..

Yeah, humans don't do equilibrium. Nature attempts to do it for us but has a very hard job.