Bitcoin needs to change to avoid the inevitable environmentalist backlash

[Elwar]

Huh? Are you insinuating humans don't need to heat things and many of those things aren't heated with electricity?

Purely from the 2nd law of thermodynamics.

Perhaps you missed it:

[monsterer]

Good luck with your alt.

I didn't realise I had one?

In truth, I don't know what should replace proof of work. What I do know is that there ought to be more pressure on the core bitcoin developers to find a solution *before* the public outcry occurs.

[Buffer Overflow]

Wonder how much electricity this place guzzles up?

[inBitweTrust]

Huh? Are you insinuating humans don't need to heat things and many of those things aren't heated with electricity?

Purely from the 2nd law of thermodynamics.

So you won't bother to address the questions and answers in a thoughtful manner?

Yep, certified troll , who is probably trying to indirectly promote his PoS /DpoS coin.

No reason to respond anymore, you are ignored, thread should die.

[Elwar]

Good luck with your alt.

I didn't realise I had one?

In truth, I don't know what should replace proof of work.

Bitcoin uses proof of work.

Any crypto currency using another algorithm would be an alternative to Bitcoin.

What I do know is that there ought to be more pressure on the core bitcoin developers to find a solution *before* the public outcry occurs.

You mean the public outcry that occurs from the environmental impact of banks and fiat?

again

[monsterer]

Perhaps you missed it:

I hadn't. That's actually very useful - this says that current bitcoin mining electricity usage is roughly 600 times less than the fiat banking system. Taking into account my previous point about the cost per user, that means that, per user bitcoin mining uses 11 times more than the fiat banking system.

Talking about cost per user is important because currently bitcoin is far from at mass adoption levels, whereas fiat certainly is.

[Elwar]

Perhaps you missed it:

I hadn't. That's actually very useful - this says that current bitcoin mining electricity usage is roughly 600 times less than the fiat banking system. Taking into account my previous point about the cost per user, that means that, per user bitcoin mining uses 11 times more than the fiat banking system.

Talking about cost per user is important because currently bitcoin is far from at mass adoption levels, whereas fiat certainly is.

Proof of Work uses as much electricity to mine 1 bitcoin as it does 1,000,000 bitcoins. It has nothing to do with per user.

[Remember remember the 5th of November]

Fiat uses millions of times more energy than Bitcoin. Bitcoin will save the babies, puppies and rainbows.

As much as I love Bitcoin, please do not defend it when it comes to energy consumption.

[Elwar]

You can read the full article where the chart comes from here:

http://www.coindesk.com/microscope-conclusions-costs-bitcoin/

"As can be conclusively seen, the relative impact of the bitcoin network does not even register on the radar of the fiat and gold-based monetary systems, representing a very conservative relative environmental impact of just over 0.13%, and a relative economic impact of just under 0.04%. When one considers Koomey’s Law, we can expect energy/GH to continue to half every 18 months until 2048.

This means that we can expect our current industry best efficiency of 0.733 W/GH to reach 0.0000000873804 W/GH. Thus – armchair academics take note – in the event that bitcoin scales to a million times its current size and market cap over the next 30 years, it’s environmental impact will still be insignificant compared to existing systems."

[Elwar]

Fiat uses millions of times more energy than Bitcoin. Bitcoin will save the babies, puppies and rainbows.

As much as I love Bitcoin, please do not defend it when it comes to energy consumption.

Welcome to the thread. Perhaps you missed this:

[newflesh]

Bitcoin's environmental impact has been blown completely out of proportion, even Greenpeace are accepting btc for donations

Better to target the real environmental criminals like the coal, frack and oil industries.

[Remember remember the 5th of November]

Fiat uses millions of times more energy than Bitcoin. Bitcoin will save the babies, puppies and rainbows.

As much as I love Bitcoin, please do not defend it when it comes to energy consumption.

Welcome to the thread. Perhaps you missed this:

Any facts to back this image up? Sorry for not believing everything I see on the internet.

[Elwar]

Any facts to back this image up? Sorry for not believing everything I see on the internet.

A long series of research of each currency, a pretty good detailed read:

http://www.coindesk.com/microscope-economic-environmental-costs-bitcoin-mining/
http://www.coindesk.com/microscope-true-costs-gold-production/
http://www.coindesk.com/microscope-real-costs-dollar/
http://www.coindesk.com/microscope-conclusions-costs-bitcoin/

[inBitweTrust]

Any facts to back this image up? Sorry for not believing everything I see on the internet.

Here is the whole 5 part series :
http://www.coindesk.com/tag/under-the-microscope/

IMHO the costs of fiat are grossly under-represented by this study as well. The regulatory and enforcement costs are left out of the calculation.
In realty Fiat costs much more to society!

[Elwar]

IMHO the costs of fiat are grossly under-represented by this study as well. The regulatory and enforcement costs are left out of the calculation.
In realty Fiat costs much more to society!

Not to mention the environmental impact of the wars that take place because of and with the help of fiat systems.

[Remember remember the 5th of November]

Any facts to back this image up? Sorry for not believing everything I see on the internet.

A long series of research of each currency, a pretty good detailed read:

http://www.coindesk.com/microscope-economic-environmental-costs-bitcoin-mining/
http://www.coindesk.com/microscope-true-costs-gold-production/
http://www.coindesk.com/microscope-real-costs-dollar/
http://www.coindesk.com/microscope-conclusions-costs-bitcoin/

I can only see the energy usage growing further. Because reducing the watt per GH/s will not be infinite, so far we've seen exceptional reduction <1w per gh, but we will reach a stage or phase where the reductions are so minuscule, that the overall mining power usage will grow as more miners are added.

[inBitweTrust]

I can only see the energy usage growing further. Because reducing the watt per GH/s will not be infinite, so far we've seen exceptional reduction <1w per gh, but we will reach a stage or phase where the reductions are so minuscule, that the overall mining power usage will grow as more miners are added.

And at that stage the economics will force miners to decentralize and create efficient heat as a product with PoW as a free byproduct to subsidize the energy bill.

[Elwar]

I can only see the energy usage growing further. Because reducing the watt per GH/s will not be infinite, so far we've seen exceptional reduction <1w per gh, but we will reach a stage or phase where the reductions are so minuscule, that the overall mining power usage will grow as more miners are added.

"When one considers Koomey’s Law, we can expect energy/GH to continue to half every 18 months until 2048.
This means that we can expect our current industry best efficiency of 0.733 W/GH to reach 0.0000000873804 W/GH."

[Elwar]

I am still waiting for the inevitable environmental backlash from the 390 million tonnes of CO2 produced by the banking system.

[PenAndPaper]

Does anyone make noise about the energy cost of the internet? 

The answer to environmental concerns isn't to deny evolution and progress of the human culture and civilization.
The answer lies in things like alternative energy sources etc.