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A comment on The Crypto-Chernobyl.

Re:The Crypto-Chernobyl by devname on Wednesday February 10, 2021 @07:50PM (#26096874)
The energy usage is for mining new bitcoin and collecting fees, not "7 transactions per second". Newly mined bitcoin will be used for infinite future transactions.

If you want more settlement with same store-of-value properties, use Bitcoin Cash.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:The Crypto-Chernobyl by PragmaticPulp on Wednesday February 10, 2021 @08:23PM (#26097117)
> The energy usage is for mining new bitcoin and collecting fees, not "7 transactions per second".

I think you've misunderstood. The mining fees you cited are for those 7 transactions per second. Miners collect fees for processing those transactions.

Focusing on the dollar amount of those Bitcoin or how many times a Bitcoin can be re-used is irrelevant. If anything, it's bizarrely wasteful that Bitcoin requires the energy consumption of a medium sized country just to continue confirming that your balance hasn't changed.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:The Crypto-Chernobyl by ywei3410 on Wednesday February 10, 2021 @08:26PM (#26097145)
Or, to put it more strongly, if no-one mined bitcoin tomorrow, you literally can't transact anymore. Bitcoin PoW /needs/ the energy consumption to function at all.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:The Crypto-Chernobyl by tylersmith on Wednesday February 10, 2021 @08:31PM (#26097186)
The energy usage is for keeping transactions that have happened from being reorged out of the chain.
[ Parent | on HN ]