Every $1 of BTC value responsible for $0.49 in health and climate damages in US

Re:Every $1 of BTC value responsible for $0.49 in health and... by random5634 on Thursday March 04, 2021 @12:35PM (#26345322)

And neither is highlighting bitcoin, especially by focusing ONLY on the mining aspect of it. The use of the network is also part of the bitcoin story. If instead of using new bitcoins mined they did transaction value per day (ie, $20B+) the math would be totally different.

If you applied this same damage model to something people had fondness for (ie, driving an electric car) you'd realize we should be working as HARD as we can to kill EV cars dead, because there is a MASSIVE unaccounted for cost to charging them (using this model).

Reality though is bitcoin chases low cost power, and that is currently often actually green (hydro, excess solar during day when their is curtailment and negative pricing etc). I can't imagine the economics making sense to mine using coal power.

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Re:Every $1 of BTC value responsible for $0.49 in health and... by jf22 on Thursday March 04, 2021 @01:02PM (#26345768)

What good would transaction value per day be? This is like counting your salary twice, once when you earn it, once when you spend it, lol.

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Re:Every $1 of BTC value responsible for $0.49 in health and... by random5634 on Thursday March 04, 2021 @01:15PM (#26345962)

Because the transactional ledger of bitcoin is what is driving electricity use, and another statement might be, for every $1 transacted on the bitcoin ledger, 0.0005 dollars in health damage is caused. (it's roughly a factor of 1000 more volume then new mining, and over time new mining is going to get smaller and smaller)

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Re:Every $1 of BTC value responsible for $0.49 in health and... by jf22 on Friday March 05, 2021 @08:46AM (#26356789)

You mean the mining isn't driving electricity use?

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