But many do. Who is right?
[0]: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S092134492...
[0]: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S092134492...
The same goes for any stock in the S&P 500. Market Cap is just a number.
We don't ration energy usage to the bare essentials in free countries. That's the sort of thing that people attempt to escape.
As with many things, there is not a single 'right' or wrong, but degrees of evidence. Highlighting current chain inefficiencies allows future versions to better mitigate these energy impacts. Honing any process to use less energy while achieving similar or better results is not an unreasonable goal.
Re: your first point, am I right to understand that entities that are able to afford higher usage should have no qualms doing so?
"Peer-reviewed" is meaningless if it's not scientific, fact-based.
> articles on current waste
See, you start with the assumption that it's wasted. You can only come to that conclusion if you assume that bitcoin serves little or no purpose.
> Honing any process to use less energy while achieving similar or better results is not an unreasonable goal.
Energy usage is what brought humanity from stone tools and caves to the moon, using energy is a good thing that advances civilization. Energy production can be problematic, which bitcoin doesn't do. Proof of work is one of the core innovations, there is no system that has better results.
Both can be accounted for: would you not rather see a version where these issues are accounted for? PoS is a sure way forward, but there are still many legacy chains around that do not benefit from this [0].
[0]: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S03014...
No, PoS is a total failure. As it is not tied to reality the history of the ledger can be modified at will. There is no independent way of knowing which chain is the "real" one. There is no independent way of knowing which "validators" are valid. You can not leave the network and rejoin and be sure about the history without trusting some third party. This is the problem that PoW solved and PoS doesn't.