TD₿: A More Complete Picture of Bitcoin's Energy Usage by Daniel Batten
TL;DR Bitcoin's energy usage has a more diverse energy mix than the narrative perpetuated by Bitcoin critics.
Hey Bitcoiners,
A topic that will no doubt continue to be debated well into the future is Bitcoin’s energy use. It is becoming obvious that Bitcoin’s energy usage will be used to frame Bitcoin as wasteful and harmful by policymakers and critics who want to see Bitcoin fail.
This has been a common argument used by bought and paid for Bitcoin critics like Greenpeace and U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren.
Just last week, Warren chastised Bitcoin in a WSJ Op-Ed for “polluting and straining power grids” and went on to say that miners “should be required to disclose their emissions and energy consumption to the public.”
The whole thing is absurd when you consider that Bitcoin’s energy use is almost a non-factor when it comes to the total global energy supply. It makes up <0.1% of the total global energy supply, a rounding error.
Another criticism you’ll often come across is that a majority of Bitcoin miners run on “dirty energy resources” like coal.
This continues to get perpetuated despite data like the 3rd Global Cryptoasset Benchmarking Study from Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance in 2021, which found that 76% of surveyed miners use renewables as part of their mix, and 39% of total energy consumption comes from renewables.
This means that, as of 2021, Bitcoin mining had one of the highest penetrations of renewables as a total percentage of its primary energy resources when compared with any other industry on the planet.
However, this study from Cambridge should not be considered complete in that all miners on the network do not participate in their survey, and it does not include off-grid miners, which have grown to become a greater percentage of the overall hash rate since 2020.
That’s why it’s encouraging to see field research being done by Bitcoiners like Daniel Batten to obtain a more accurate picture of the composition of the mining industry. For the last 6 months, Daniel has been on the ground performing field research at 42 Bitcoin mining facilities to collect quality data about the makeup of their energy resources.
Here are some of the main findings of his study:
Also, here are some graphic representations of the data he collected:
As you can see, Bitcoin’s energy use is not only more “clean” than is typically reported, but the trend is also moving in the right direction, given the incentives for miners to find cheaper sources of energy.
You can read the full report from Daniel here, and I recommend checking out the Twitter thread he wrote, which includes more graphics and a video. (11/30/2022)
It’s Bitcoiners like Daniel who is putting in the real work to help drive this industry forward. His field research will provide Bitcoiners with more accurate data to combat the misinformation and FUD spread by Bitcoin haters.
This is one of the reasons why I think Bitcoin will win. In general, the Bitcoiners I have met are driven people who are not afraid to get their hands dirty and show Proof of Work.
When a group of individuals is inspired, hard-working, and pushing towards a single mission, they become unstoppable…kind of like Bitcoin itself.
Tick tock next block,
Sam Callahan
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Meme of the Day
Why don't you send the bitcoin energy usage report every time it comes out to Elizabeth Warren and all skeptics to see?
Great reading thanks
Great read, as always