Banks Consume Over Three Times More Energy Than Bitcoin!

[tsg]

Interesting article in Bitcoinist:

According to Katrina Kelly-Pitou, the popular debate on whether or not Bitcoin’s network electricity consumption is causing serious damage to our climate is not headed in the right direction. Kelly-Pitou is a clean energy technology researcher at the University of Pittsburg,

Citing recent studies, which suggest Bitcoin dramatically increases the consumption of electricity on a global scale, Kelly-Pitou claims that experts are failing to understand some of the basics behind renewable energy systems:

Electricity production can increase while still maintaining a minimal impact on the environment. Rather than focusing on how much energy Bitcoin uses, the discussion should center around who indeed is producing it – and where their power comes from.

While she doesn’t neglect the substantial amount of electricity used for Bitcoin mining, she also notes that banking alone consumes “an estimated 100 terawatts.”

This is a little bit more than three times the energy Bitcoin mining consumes. She also makes an interesting claim, assuming 100x increase in Bitcoin’s current market size. Kelly-Pitou notes:

If Bitcoin technology were to mature by more than 100 times its current market size, it would still equal only 2 percent of all energy consumption.

The whole article: https://app.algory.io/app/cryptonews/81214/banks-consume-over-three-times-more

What do you think about it? On Twitter someone said: "Now... let's talk about how banks destroy environment, shall we?"

But the fact is that banks process much more transactions than blockchains now. What would be the real energy consumption if all transactions (processed now by banks), would be in blockchain?

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[Ayston]

As bank rely on electricity for every transaction, they use computer to process transaction and to  pull information from the mother board and also atm machine need electricity to process cash withdrawal... Depending on the size of the bank it does really consume more energy than mining Bitcoin or BTC activity... But it does change the issue if we talk about big mining equipment...

[fargoway]

Not defending banks at all, but they support much more transactions than Bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency. So if we compare the consumption of electricity by each, then we should remember the number of work done as well.

[Betwrong]

~

But the fact is that banks process much more transactions than blockchains now. What would be the real energy consumption if all transactions (processed now by banks), would be in blockchain?

The energy consumption in Bitcoin's case depends not on the number of transactions but rather on the difficulty or, in other words, on the number of nodes. I read somewhere that, theoretically, several nodes would be enough to process all the transactions and that we have a lot of nodes not because they are necessary but because people want to receive the mining rewards. So, theoretically, we might not need more energy consumption if all transactions processed now by banks were in blockchain. CMIIW.

[bob123]

Not defending banks at all, but they support much more transactions than Bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency. So if we compare the consumption of electricity by each, then we should remember the number of work done as well.

That's a good point.
Currently, the bitcoin network consumes more energy per transaction than banks.

But if you'd compare this all with the LN being used as proposed (assuming the development progresses as expected), i'd be sure that the bitcoin network would consume by far less energy for the same amount of transactions.

This of course does require the LN to work as expected and to actually be adopted. Whether this will really happen in the future is unknown. Only time will tell if its going to work as expected.
One thing is safe. If it is going to deilver what it promises.. scaling, fees and energy efficiency shouldn't be any reason for FUD anymore.
And banks will be way less efficient compared to the capability of the proposed network.

[LeGaulois]

And we forgot to consider the full resources needed by banks. Yes, banks handle more transactions than Bitcoin, but banks don't only use energy/computer power for its transactions, what about the storages needed, what about the indirect expenses. While your bankster sit down on his chair he does not pedal to produce energy, his office uses energy too, when he goes to toilets he uses energy too, the transport of money, paying the employees, emails sent, letters sent, and so, are something to take in consideration

[Natasha95]

However, you have an interesting article, it's funny what you mentioned about the environment on Twitter.

Also, I was surprised by the comment about the nodes when mining bitcoins. I never thought it was possible.

[Pearls Before Swine]

Interesting article.  There has been much ado about how much electricity bitcoin requires, and it cannot be argued that it doesn't require a lot.  It does.  What society does have is a great deal of electricity, and whether that's bad for the environment or not is a debate of its own but what I would say is that if it ever comes to pass that society falls into a crisis whereby the grids are disrupted, we are all in serious trouble and bitcoin failing will seem trivial.  It won't even matter to most people.  They will be trying to conserve resources, and those will be the most basic things needed for survival, like keeping the power on in hospitals and so forth.

While your bankster sit down on his chair he does not pedal to produce energy

That would be highly amusing to see that happen.  In any event we have plenty of power, as I said.  If and when it becomes a concern, society will have more problems than anything the banking system could produce.  Buy land, seeds, and firearms. 

[darthmaul]

Amazon how this article and news is hot topic all over the forum now. I guess there is nothing wrong if the banks are using the energy like that. They are also having huge expense than the bitcoin. Dont forget that bitcoin also runs with the connected computers all over the world and thus it gets distributed all over through the network like that. If we start calculating the power of computer used then surely it will end up more than banks.
Banks have the servers up and running all the time and they need to be connected 24x7 to fulfil the requests of users. Plus the surveillance of the banks and security guards and many more things you name it can take up huge energy mate.

[cellard]

Not defending banks at all, but they support much more transactions than Bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency. So if we compare the consumption of electricity by each, then we should remember the number of work done as well.

You can't compare the transactions that banks process (that is, centralized transactions, permissioned and so on) with a decentralized transaction system like bitcoin. You are comparing apples to oranges.

All the electricity that the bitcoin network consumes is not wasted, it is a necessity to keep the blockchain safe.

And if LN allows to scale transactions, it may surpass all centralized payment networks. I haven't done the math for this, but intuitively I think would be cheaper compared to all the electricity banks and so on are using. Just imagine the amount of electricity one of these huge buildings consume.

[Waticta]

Not defending banks at all, but they support much more transactions than Bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency. So if we compare the consumption of electricity by each, then we should remember the number of work done as well.

With the implementation of LN, we will have more transactions in the future.

[bobo012]

Ofcourse they consume more, but you wont see news about that anywhere. Just about bad bad bitcoin. And why is that? Because bitcoin is bothering big guys. They wont undermine their precious broken bank system with headlines like that

[erominer]

this is very hard to prove at his point of time maybe because there's a big percentage of the world population that are not using bitcoins.

[NeMa94]

No one can deny that amount of energy used for mining is big, but let's face it - there are so many troubles with environment caused by us these days that this is just the tip of the iceberg. Focus on cleaning floating plastic islands and reducing junk. It seems that Bitcoin miners are the main problem of the environment, while eyes are closed for the obvious. Btw, I truly like the way it was pointed out that this is not the real and the biggest problem of mankind and that there are some previous ones that should be addressed.

[adzino]

-snip-
All the electricity that the bitcoin network consumes is not wasted, it is a necessity to keep the blockchain safe.

Fargoway never said anything about wastage of electricity. Not sure how you got that impression.
Anyways, bank processes way more transactions than bitcoin does. Don't forget that only few percentage of people around world are actually using bitcoin to conduct day to day transactions, where as almost every people around the world are using banks to conduct transactions. So the comparison that is being done is actually absurd.

[DOH!]

Ofcourse they consume more, but you wont see news about that anywhere. Just about bad bad bitcoin. And why is that? Because bitcoin is bothering big guys. They wont undermine their precious broken bank system with headlines like that

I agree with your comment and I think people are trying to lower the value of Bitcoin to make it worse in the eyes of many. But I think these things will make more and more people interested and invest in Bitcoin and cryptocurrency.

[TimeTeller]

Not defending banks at all, but they support much more transactions than Bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency. So if we compare the consumption of electricity by each, then we should remember the number of work done as well.

You can't compare the transactions that banks process (that is, centralized transactions, permissioned and so on) with a decentralized transaction system like bitcoin. You are comparing apples to oranges.

All the electricity that the bitcoin network consumes is not wasted, it is a necessity to keep the blockchain safe.

And if LN allows to scale transactions, it may surpass all centralized payment networks. I haven't done the math for this, but intuitively I think would be cheaper compared to all the electricity banks and so on are using. Just imagine the amount of electricity one of these huge buildings consume.

Bitcoin and banks I believe, are still incomparable at this time.
Many people around the globe are still relying with banks while only small percentage are utilizing the bitcoin network.
It's overwhelming to think about how much energy is consuming by the banks everyday.
Yet, we are still very far from the scenario of using the blockchain instead of the conventional method.
But, we are heading to a good future. Banks are starting to see the benefits of blockchain within their system.
Give it a time and most of them are running their system via blockchain.

[KingScorpio]

Interesting article in Bitcoinist:

According to Katrina Kelly-Pitou, the popular debate on whether or not Bitcoin’s network electricity consumption is causing serious damage to our climate is not headed in the right direction. Kelly-Pitou is a clean energy technology researcher at the University of Pittsburg,

Citing recent studies, which suggest Bitcoin dramatically increases the consumption of electricity on a global scale, Kelly-Pitou claims that experts are failing to understand some of the basics behind renewable energy systems:

Electricity production can increase while still maintaining a minimal impact on the environment. Rather than focusing on how much energy Bitcoin uses, the discussion should center around who indeed is producing it – and where their power comes from.

While she doesn’t neglect the substantial amount of electricity used for Bitcoin mining, she also notes that banking alone consumes “an estimated 100 terawatts.”

This is a little bit more than three times the energy Bitcoin mining consumes. She also makes an interesting claim, assuming 100x increase in Bitcoin’s current market size. Kelly-Pitou notes:

If Bitcoin technology were to mature by more than 100 times its current market size, it would still equal only 2 percent of all energy consumption.

The whole article: https://app.algory.io/app/cryptonews/81214/banks-consume-over-three-times-more

What do you think about it? On Twitter someone said: "Now... let's talk about how banks destroy environment, shall we?"

But the fact is that banks process much more transactions than blockchains now. What would be the real energy consumption if all transactions (processed now by banks), would be in blockchain?

banks are institutions to recognize worthy enterpreneuers giving them power. so they can develop useful social structures. bitcoin only wastes energy to provide lambos for its miners. bitcoin is doomed

[ucingucingan]

yes of course because conventional banks have a lot of equipment that they use to make transactions and of course that requires a lot of energy when compared to using bitcoin, bitcoin transactions only require miners, then computer devices that have been installed with bitcoin wallets are enough to be able to carry out transactions of any destination with easy, cheap and efficient

[stellaekun]

Interesting debate. Those who argue that bitcoin consumes energy often forget that there is so much energy expended by banks especially in running their back office.

[countryfree]

Poor debate and poor article, because the claims about the energy consumption of banks is not documented. More than that, I just cannot imagine how it would be possible to calculate the energy consumption of all banks in the world. What's the method? How to get the data? Does anyone thinks it's possible to walk into a bank, and ask politely how much electricity they've consumed the past month? This is secret information.

There's no doubt the banking sector needs huge quantity of electricity, but then, their services are huge. I'm always amazed when I'm in Asia to see that transactions from my European credit card are accepted within seconds. if the banking sector total energy consumption is only 3 times more than BTC, this is quite terrible news for BTC...

[stompix]

And we forgot to consider the full resources needed by banks. Yes, banks handle more transactions than Bitcoin, but banks don't only use energy/computer power for its transactions, what about the storages needed, what about the indirect expenses. While your bankster sit down on his chair he does not pedal to produce energy, his office uses energy too, when he goes to toilets he uses energy too, the transport of money, paying the employees, emails sent, letters sent, and so, are something to take in consideration

And at this point, you would have to add also the power consumption done by exchanges, online wallets, payment gateways ASIC manufacturers, nodes,

And to make things fair...we should take out from the bank's consumption the amount of energy wasted by people doing bank transfers to buy and sell coins, right?  

And if LN allows to scale transactions, it may surpass all centralized payment networks. I haven't done the math for this, but intuitively I think would be cheaper compared to all the electricity banks and so on are using. Just imagine the amount of electricity one of these huge buildings consume.

We still have empty blocks...LN is needed only if we experience again an increase in transactions...
But it's been 8 months since the spam attack and the network has not experienced a single day of clogging.

And...the hashrate has doubled since April:P

[cellard]

Not defending banks at all, but they support much more transactions than Bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency. So if we compare the consumption of electricity by each, then we should remember the number of work done as well.

You can't compare the transactions that banks process (that is, centralized transactions, permissioned and so on) with a decentralized transaction system like bitcoin. You are comparing apples to oranges.

All the electricity that the bitcoin network consumes is not wasted, it is a necessity to keep the blockchain safe.

And if LN allows to scale transactions, it may surpass all centralized payment networks. I haven't done the math for this, but intuitively I think would be cheaper compared to all the electricity banks and so on are using. Just imagine the amount of electricity one of these huge buildings consume.

Bitcoin and banks I believe, are still incomparable at this time.
Many people around the globe are still relying with banks while only small percentage are utilizing the bitcoin network.
It's overwhelming to think about how much energy is consuming by the banks everyday.
Yet, we are still very far from the scenario of using the blockchain instead of the conventional method.
But, we are heading to a good future. Banks are starting to see the benefits of blockchain within their system.
Give it a time and most of them are running their system via blockchain.

What people are missing here is the fact that only a tiny amount of the world's population actually have access to solid bank accounts, and let alone access to markets to invest and so on.

Imagine the amount of electricity that would be needed to power all these people with bank accounts. That means buildings, computers, etc.

With the current hashrate of the Bitcoin network is more than enough to keep developing second layers and have all these people transacting, using "bitcoin banks". You might say "but centralization this or that". Well, what is better, living in the muds with 0 chances to develop an economy, or actually have a chance with bitcoin through LN? because these people will never be included within the global economy by the legacy banking system because it's just impossible. With BTC and second layers they only need some nokia phones.

[Betwrong]

And we forgot to consider the full resources needed by banks. Yes, banks handle more transactions than Bitcoin, but banks don't only use energy/computer power for its transactions, what about the storages needed, what about the indirect expenses. While your bankster sit down on his chair he does not pedal to produce energy, his office uses energy too, when he goes to toilets he uses energy too, the transport of money, paying the employees, emails sent, letters sent, and so, are something to take in consideration

And at this point, you would have to add also the power consumption done by exchanges, online wallets, payment gateways ASIC manufacturers, nodes,
~

That's right, but on the other hand I think it's important to note that Bitcoin network doesn't need so many nodes as it has today to perform all the today's transactions and much more. I know some people think that the more transactions in the network the higher the difficulty, but that's not the case. The difficulty is rising with more miners joining the network, and although we can't forbid people mine BTC if they want to, for fairness' sake we must say that the network doesn't need so many of them. I think it's important for understanding the advantages of the blockchain technology in general.

[TooDumbForBitcoin]

Furthermore most of large miners trying to use green energy, because it is cheaper. Technology progress will require extra computational resources in any way.

[magneto]

It's also worth taking into consideration the fact that banks have to take up significantly more real estate, which needs development in the first place to be functional and operating, compared to the bitcoin network which has much less demand on real estate and farms or individual nodes can be run from essentially anywhere.

Is it really comparable, though? It's a flawed debate either way.

Just to name one flaw, where are the statistics on how electricity used by these two different networks is produced? E.g., whether bitcoin mining uses renewable energy sources more, or not?

Obviously, bitcoin energy consumption is an issue. But, I feel like it much less of an issue than people make it out to be. It has significantly less ecological affects than say, gold or silver mining, even.

[stompix]

And we forgot to consider the full resources needed by banks. Yes, banks handle more transactions than Bitcoin, but banks don't only use energy/computer power for its transactions, what about the storages needed, what about the indirect expenses. While your bankster sit down on his chair he does not pedal to produce energy, his office uses energy too, when he goes to toilets he uses energy too, the transport of money, paying the employees, emails sent, letters sent, and so, are something to take in consideration

And at this point, you would have to add also the power consumption done by exchanges, online wallets, payment gateways ASIC manufacturers, nodes,
~

That's right, but on the other hand I think it's important to note that Bitcoin network doesn't need so many nodes as it has today to perform all the today's transactions and much more. I know some people think that the more transactions in the network the higher the difficulty, but that's not the case. The difficulty is rising with more miners joining the network, and although we can't forbid people mine BTC if they want to, for fairness' sake we must say that the network doesn't need so many of them. I think it's important for understanding the advantages of the blockchain technology in general.

A large number of nodes are also required to keep the network safe
Miners are needed as long as POW exists, the more the better and if they are distinct individuals and companies even better, there is no debate here.

The problem most people don't understand is that bitcoin mining can't be compared to anything else.
It's pretty simple, there are 1800 coins mined each day worth ~ 6700 $ plus rewards.

No matter how many transactions, no matter how "efficient" miners get, they will compete for this sum.
And if their business runs on electricity costs being  80% of the revenue, miners will consume up to 80% (or 9 millions$  of this ) in electricity.
If Bitcoin reaches 67k$ they will burn each day 90 million in electricity and if it goes to 67$ only 90k$ worth.

Those will be the numbers, no matter how many transactions there are or how efficient miners will be or how green the energy is.

Banks don't work like this, banks follow the number of customers. If a branch is overwhelmed by customers they open a new one in the area, if it's deserted it gets closed down.

[carlisle1]

This will take a great debate as many negative things had been thrown to this community regarding electricity consumption and the effect to the environment when the truth is not,instead this damn banks are the one that bringing more damage in the environment than cryptocurrency

[Nyak put]

Not defendings banks at al

[Ctn]

So whats the exact point of this discussion? Whether we should be saying that bitcoin use should be increased a lot so that we can have the green energy zone everywhere. I mean if thats gonna consume less power and thus its gonna make things environment friendly then one should always be making things more introvert to it rather than traditional things. Many times we have to forget the traditional things which can be inefficient in the current era, and in this regards it is the banking itself. But hey lets think about it, is bitcoin that much sustainable for daily use ? Will it make things easier as like fiat currency? There are many more question before we can hit to that level.

[bob123]

But hey lets think about it, is bitcoin that much sustainable for daily use ?

Sure, why not ?
The only problem is when a merchant needs to get a minimum of $-value for the product.

If (better: When) prices are going to be calculated in satoshis, i don't see a reason why bitcoin shouldn't be sustainable for daily use.
Especially with developments like the LN which will reduce the average fee per tx.

Will it make things easier as like fiat currency?

It is not always about being easier.
It is about taking the control away from banks and the government and give each individual user full control over his/her money.

And with ApplePay and GooglePay, where you need to bind your credit card to your mobile, it is as 'easy' or 'difficult' as using bitcoin when paying.
The only difference is that with BTC, you own your money. And with a credit card, you don't.

There are many more question before we can hit to that level.

Which questions ?
Feel free to post them here.

[trako]

The amount of energy the banks consume is very high. but we should not think of this as just energy excellence.
banks offer hundreds of thousands of people jobs. and a lot of people are making money with this earned money. I think this is very important.
If there were no banks, unemployment would increase.
also states are taking taxes from the banks. this is a long-term ecosystem. it would be wrong to just think of the energy you are spending. it offers a lot of benefits.
I do not defend the benches. but we need a bank.

[bob123]

banks offer hundreds of thousands of people jobs.
[...]
If there were no banks, unemployment would increase.

The same applies to war.
War offers hundreds of thousands of people jobs.
If there were no war, unemployment would increase..

Does this mean war is good ? I don't think so..

That's not an argument in my eyes.

it offers a lot of benefits.

For example ?
The benefit of not being allowed to withdraw a lot of (my own) money without answering questions regarding the usage of that money ?
The benefit of not being able to use a large deposit without clarifying where that money comes from ?
The benefit of not being able to withdraw more than X $ (where X is a number chosen by banks: e.g. look at greece. Max 50€ withdrawal per day was allowed).
The benefit of getting your funds frozen, because.. hell.. why not.. its a bank.

I do not defend the benches. but we need a bank.

No, we don't need banks.
The only purpose of a bank is to manage your money upon your behalf.

I don't need a bank for that. I am fine with managing my money myself.
If stores/shops and employer would support payments in bitcoin, i'd stop using my bank account and would start using btc only.

[rhodelmabanal]

The amount of energy the banks consume is very high. but we should not think of this as just energy excellence.
banks offer hundreds of thousands of people jobs. and a lot of people are making money with this earned money. I think this is very important.
If there were no banks, unemployment would increase.
also states are taking taxes from the banks. this is a long-term ecosystem. it would be wrong to just think of the energy you are spending. it offers a lot of benefits.
I do not defend the benches. but we need a bank.

Banks and the government is affiliated with each other when it comes to profitable aspects. When they used more energy than of bitcoin transactions like miners power usage, I guess it's time to divert on particular platform which banking and digital currency will be merged.