I am curious, why did you believe that posting this comment to HN would benefit the community? It has no new information and, to somebody like me with a more nuanced view of crypto, just appear stupid and arrogant.

Compare Bitcoin's energy consumption to a country like China. It's not so devastating to the planet. Bitcoin currently consumes around 110 TWh per year — 0.55% of global electricity production, or roughly equivalent to the annual energy draw of small countries like Malaysia or Sweden. China as of 2019 was ~39,000 TWh, with the China ban the energy consumption can only improve. As miners move away from coal and on to more renewable sources and countries.

> China as of 2019 was ~39,000 TWh

That's more than the whole world (per your own numbers, 110 / 0.0055 = 20,000). I am seeing more like 7,500 TWh for 2019.[0]

Also, 1.4 billion people live in China and they make a huge amount of the world's durable goods, so it makes sense that they will consume some power. Bitcoin does jack shit.

[0]https://www.climatescorecard.org/2021/01/electricity-consump...

If China uses 3900TWh a year, that would be twice the global consumption by your claim that 110TWh = 0.55% global. Of course that number is about an order of magnitude off.

If Bitcoin being as useless as it is consumes 0.55% of global electricity isn’t alarming I don’t know what is.

got my China data from here https://ourworldindata.org/energy/country/china

Okay, I misread your energy to electricity-only comparison. Divide 0.55% by 5 and it’s still alarming.

You also need to quantify all the non-electricity energy use going into the Bitcoin equal system, including but not limited to hardware production, transportation, depreciation, etc. I’m not sure if those are negligible.

Why would anyone compare electric consumption of a country with digital currency? That is the most ridiculous comparison I've ever seen. In terms of reaching, this reaching to mars and possibly beyond. Lets compare energy consumption of bitcoin with online banking. That's at least in the same neighborhood. A country contributions to mankind include infrastructure, manufacturing, mining, powering hospitals, airports, schools, sewage system, trains, telecommunication, research labs, libraries, warehouses, ..... list goes on. What does bitcoin does? nothing. There is no comparison.

> Why would anyone compare electric consumption of a country with digital currency?

Because we don't operate in GW / TW units typically, so some size comparison is needed for mental visualisation. In the same way I'd say "about the size of a basketball" rather than "it's 250 cubic cm".

No you didn't just compare to demonstrate difference in units, you asserted that bitcoin energy consumption is harmless as it only makes a tiny percentage of China's total consumption. Which is like saying oh these shoes cost $8k but that's nothing compared to your house! what???

I didn't assert any of that. I think you got users confused.

you're engaging in bad faith, please review the HN's guidelines and present arguments and facts, not your personal opinion

You' cognitive dissonance is in bad faith. If you want to communicate here, get over it.

Can you think of anything you do or purchase that contributes to destroying the planet?