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A comment on China's Ban on Bitcoin Follows a Pattern Frequently Used by Beijing. Parent comment

Re:China's Ban on Bitcoin Follows a Pattern Frequently Used ... by mrpbennett on Tuesday July 13, 2021 @01:35PM (#27823735)
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.
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Re:China's Ban on Bitcoin Follows a Pattern Frequently Used ... by rspeele on Tuesday July 13, 2021 @01:48PM (#27823891)
> 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...

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Re:China's Ban on Bitcoin Follows a Pattern Frequently Used ... by oefrha on Tuesday July 13, 2021 @01:47PM (#27823879)
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.

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Re:China's Ban on Bitcoin Follows a Pattern Frequently Used ... by mrpbennett on Tuesday July 13, 2021 @02:07PM (#27824159)
got my China data from here https://ourworldindata.org/energy/country/china
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Re:China's Ban on Bitcoin Follows a Pattern Frequently Used ... by oefrha on Tuesday July 13, 2021 @02:18PM (#27824270)
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.

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Re:China's Ban on Bitcoin Follows a Pattern Frequently Used ... by techsin101 on Tuesday July 13, 2021 @01:44PM (#27823833)
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.
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Re:China's Ban on Bitcoin Follows a Pattern Frequently Used ... by viraptor on Tuesday July 13, 2021 @04:35PM (#27825976)
> 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".

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Re:China's Ban on Bitcoin Follows a Pattern Frequently Used ... by techsin101 on Tuesday July 13, 2021 @09:24PM (#27828437)
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???
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Re:China's Ban on Bitcoin Follows a Pattern Frequently Used ... by viraptor on Wednesday July 14, 2021 @04:21AM (#27830857)
I didn't assert any of that. I think you got users confused.
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