with your definitions in mind, i think mining is a lot more appropriate, haha
Here is an example: https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1351214402167578626
It talks about crypto mining as a last resort to utilizing excess energy produced by “green” sources (wind turbine), ie energy that cannot be sold to the grid or stored in batteries.
It's literally un-doing the progress we've made towards a renewable energy market.
It's a fantasy that (a) there's actually tons of energy floating around out there in the wild that can't be stored in some way or transported in some way and (b) that co-locating miners there is more economical than throwing some coal onto the fire.
[1] https://qz.com/1250980/an-australian-coal-power-plant-will-r...
> It's a fantasy that
It absolutely is not a "fantasy". It's called curtailment and it can be greater than 50% at certain times of day in certain areas. Ontario wind production for example curtails 25% of it's energy on average. Please do your research before speaking with so much authority. https://www.iea.org/commentaries/more-of-a-good-thing-is-sur...
Not necessarily, no. There's no free energy you can just plug into. If the energy is far-flung and remote, then you need to build infrastructure, to co-locate your miners, to build buildings, to build generators, to maintain and service these generators. If it's distributed enough, the lack of economy of scale offsets the fact that you're not paying anything for the power per se. This is self-evident in the fact these "free" energy sources aren't hooked up to the grid.
There's a real economy of scale associated with a big coal plant.
Hence: It is a fantasy that (b) ...co-locating miners there is more economical than throwing some coal onto the fire.
> It absolutely is not a "fantasy". It's called curtailment and it can be greater than 50% at certain times of day in certain areas.
That article's title alone moots your point. "More of a good thing – is surplus renewable electricity an opportunity for early decarbonisation?"
If you use it for mining, it's not going to be used for decarbonization is it?
The tendency is to treat this primarily as a technology problem for the power system to solve. Indeed part of the solution will lie in improvements in technology. We will need some form of energy storage to convert the excess at one time of day into necessary power system supply at another. Smart grids, especially smarter distribution systems, will be better able to manage increasing shares of renewables as well – and they too will likely have more energy storage. And finally, the growth of EVs (currently driving global battery demand) represents a huge potential source of storage and demand-side flexibility as well.
Hence: It is a fantasy that (a) there's actually tons of energy floating around out there in the wild that can't be stored in some way or transported in some way. I said can't, not isn't, not shouldn't be.
You've in fact strengthened by point because there's enough there to lead to early decarbonization!
> Bitcoin let’s anyone with excess energy manufacture sound money. This is a better option than wasting the energy.
There are times where the grid is producing more energy than is being demanded but it's not like it's that difference that's being used to mine. I also don't get why that energy would need to be turned into money. Simply creating new coins isn't useful work (validating transactions is, but it's a horribly inefficient way to do that)
That never happens. The production and demand in the electric grid must always be matched. When they are not, the voltage and frequency increase (excess production) or decrease (excess demand), and control mechanisms on all generators in the grid regulate the production so that it matches the demand again; if that's not possible (because the production and demand are too mismatched), safety mechanisms disconnect parts of the grid (and power off the generators) to avoid costly damage.
It's not "inefficient", relatively speaking, if there's no more efficient way to do it while still achieving the same risk profile.
And yes, in most cases we can pay each other just fine without Bitcoin. That doesn't negate its specific usefulness.
It's already well documented that you don't see the trustlessness and decentralization to be a value for you personally. If that's the case then simply don't buy any. Those who do get value from those properties will use it, as is the case now.
This is literally everyone's problem now and we should all do everything we can, tell everyone we can, to shut this down before it's too late.
Your game of pass-the-spreadsheet-cell is now actively threatening the lives of people on the planet at probably the most critical time in human history re: global warming. I have general distaste for the MLM nature of most coins in this frothy climate - but those $SAFEMOON and $CUMMIES folks are just going to lose money, not ruin Earth. I mostly do everything I can to end Bitcoin by raising awareness. You should too.
I'd be just as vocal if your coin was based on proof-of-killing-elephants or proof-of-having-a-tire-fire-on-your-lawn.
[1] https://digiconomist.net/bitcoin-energy-consumption
[2] https://www.newsbtc.com/news/bitcoin/australian-power-compan...
Ideally you'd have the compute power be tiny amounts divided up over a large number of people. But that would require everyone participating to be principled and using Bitcoin because of its decentralized nature instead of as a way to make money. Human nature would never let that happen.
Your point about video games is pretty asinine because a meaningful portion of the 8 billion people on earth playing video games. We have virtually nobody using Bitcoin because its so incredibly hamstrung. [2]
Based on this data [3] playing video games for 4.4 hours a day for an entire year consumes 823kWh. A single bitcoin transaction requires 1127.77kWh. [1]. So you can either play 6 hours of video games on your 3090 in ultra 1440p144Hz - or move 250 bytes of data.
Bitcoin's 3TPS currently yields as much CO2 as burning 1 ton of coal per second and generates 10kT of non-recyclable e-waste, which also includes a bunch of gold that has to be mined to make the systems in the first place. [1]
All for 3TPS lol.
[1] https://digiconomist.net/bitcoin-energy-consumption
[2] https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/global-gaming-c...
[3] https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/global-gaming-c...
Well, I would have good points I could write. However, if you're just going to insult me, I'm not going to waste my time.
Luckily Bitcoin mining is utterly centralized. In fact turning off a single mine in Xinjiang cut power consumption by 1/4-1/2.
> Isn't that a way more obvious low hanging fruit?
No. Is idle device power in the US rising? Some data shows one of the biggest sources of idle power is halogen bulbs being left on which are being replaced with LEDs over time - unlike the exponential rise in BTC power consumption. Not to mention, it requires 400,000,000 people to each act. Killing Bitcoin requires a few people to act. Much easier. And of course, both should be done.
> Human activity uses energy, that's unavoidable.
Yes, much more when we choose intentionally 400,000X less efficient technologies because of idealism or because they're "neat." Living in a society requires we make compromises to ensure our shared survival. Our consumption is the sum of our choices. Time to start making some better ones.
This whataboutism and nihilism is pretty much a guarantee of inaction on all fronts. Step up and do the right thing!
> when we choose intentionally 400,000X less efficient technologies because of idealism or because they're "neat."
Like I mentioned already there's no reasonable way to compare its efficiency to technologies like Visa which solve a totally different problem. So this is a useless and misleading metric aside from the obvious strawman that cryptocurrencies are only useful because they are "neat".
Not talking about Bitcoin, just PoW. The implication is clear: it uses a ton of energy and achieves almost nothing with it relative to competitive technologies.
> Like I mentioned already there's no reasonable way to compare its efficiency to technologies like Visa which solve a totally different problem.
Yes there is, it's by dividing into kWh per transaction. You can't pretend this away because you don't like the landslide loss.
[edit] I'm sure you well know those counterarguments are meaningless because they fly in the face of math. Look this is typical of crypto folks, who know well they're melting the ice caps to enrich themselves. It's shameful, and you should feel bad for participating in this. The comparison in the domain is against, for instance proof of stake coins.
- The power consumption of Bitcoin has almost nothing to do with the transaction rate limit. Increasing it would have basically no impact on the power consumption. So it doesn't make sense to look at the energy usage on a per transaction basis.
- It's debatable whether there is actually a need to increase the transaction rate limit yet, whereas it's obviously necessary for Visa to process a high transaction rate right now and so it makes sense that Visa would have optimized for that already. I think even the "small blockers", who prefer the current low rate, can agree that the rate will need to be increased eventually.
I'm not bringing this up to dispute anything you just said, more that if you're looking to crusade against industries that generate a huge amount of waste to benefit a relative few, I think there's a strong argument for also killing junk mail along with PoW cryptocurrencies.
> Control over the supply of money gives central bankers the ability to steal money from the people and funnel it into paying off politicians and doing other country destroying bs.
Central banks don't print money and funnel it off to politicians lol. They control the money supply by deciding how much credit should be extended and at what interest rates and from time to time provide stability through buffering via purchase and sale of treasuries.
> Once you understand how bitcoin will eliminate a major source of corruption in our world you'll finally understand it's value.
It has created a whole slew of new kinds of corruption and crime, and all the existing corruption and crime remain. It's been a net add of corruption and crime.
No. The market does that. I'm not sure why you think this is different than how the value of, say, a dollar represents.
> Central banks don't print money and funnel it off to politicians lol.
You misunderstand. Its not that direct. Central banks print money used to fund things like government loans (ie bonds), among other things. Member banks buy the government bonds and sells them at a profit to the central bank. The owners of those member banks in turn pocket that money and use some of it to fund the legalized corruption known as lobbying. This is not the only funnel that looks like this that comes out of the financial industry. There's a reason that Goldman Sachs "alums" trawl DC like cockroches.
So.. very much not lol. Not lol at all.
> They control the money supply by deciding how much credit should be extended and at what interest rate
I think you've missed the last 15 years where they started buying whatever they want in "open market operations". Where were you in 2008... or like the last year and a half?
>It has created a whole slew of new kinds of corruption and crime
You're misinformed. Show me one way that bitcoin has lead to new kinds of corruption. I would be very surprised if you could name a single thing and have some credible information about it.
Well most markets aren’t made up of 95% fictional trades, according to an ETF that attempted to list two years ago.
> You misunderstand. Its not that direct. Central banks print money used to fund things like government loans (ie bonds), among other things.
You misunderstand. Central banks don’t print money, they set reserve rates, interest rates and they occasionally purchase and sell bonds. Nothing more.
> You're misinformed. Show me one way that bitcoin has lead to new kinds of corruption. I would be very surprised if you could name a single thing and have some credible information about it.
Ransomware and tether (unless you count the liberty reserve and even that was nowhere close).