Hi, according to Wikipedia the Bitcoin mining process "requires intense computing power, electricity and significant investment as it solves hashes through bruteforce to verify transactions and add them to the network's transaction log." So I was wondering if bitcoins and the bitcoin exchange mechanism could be adapted or replaced by a currency that was more environmentally friendly?
Some ideas:
Mine "Carbon"
By seeking out carbon dioxide capturing programs and reselling the carbon certified as captured. "Carbon" could work as a clean exchange mechanism. A currency and exchange mechanism measured in grams (or kilos, tonnes etc) of CO2 or equivalent captured.
Mine Clean Energy
By seeking out wind farms and so on and reselling the energy certified as clean. A currency and exchange mechanism measured in Joules (or kilojoules, megajoules, etc) of clean energy produced.
Mine Environmental Data
Bitcoin is harnessing enormous computing power, why not put that power to good use, distributed computing of climate models and so on. A currency measured in bits (or bytes, kilobytes etc) of data crushed by computation.
There is a simple answer to these questions - people like to get paid, and believe it or not, 95% are in the mining bussines to make money. They are not really interested in natire and stuff