> The cost of PoW is based on scarcity in energy, which incentivizes production of cheap and clean energy.
Where do you get the 'clean' from?
Where do you get the 'clean' from?
Usually the cheapest sources are also far away from people, because any local demand will increase energy price. However, when renewables near people have overcapacity, Bitcoin miners can serve as a buyer of last resort. This way, investments in renewables become more profitable.
[0] https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2021/07/renewables-cheapest-e...
We can definitely agree that crypto's demand for electricity basically doesn't care about location. So it puts a floor of demand for electricity generation in remote places. (Also in more accessible places. But there it's relatively less important.)
Electricity is both fungible to an extent, but also not as globally traded as eg wheat or oil.
You are right that on the margin Bitcoin makes generation of renewable electricity more profitable. But it also makes all other electricity generation more profitable, on the margin.
Let's see how this develops.