The New York Times: The annual carbon emissions from mining are equal to the amount emitted from New Zealand

Climate change hinders the expansion of Bitcoin production

The Bitcoin mining process is complex, and it is linked to blockchain technology.

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The process of mining a single piece of digital currency "Bitcoin" consumes a lot of electrical energy, exceeding the energy allocated to any other known digital transactions through computers, and therefore it is "not a wonderful climate thing", as described by the founder of "Microsoft", Bill Gates, finally, in The time when the big companies assert that they focus on climate and sustainability issues, which makes them close to colliding with another financial reality, which is that the issue of climate change impedes the expansion of the production of a currency with a market value of about one trillion dollars, which is Bitcoin.

The cryptocurrency, whose price this month exceeded more than $ 50,000, has become inevitable, especially with the rush of large companies, such as Tesla, and a large number of individual investors to store digital tokens.

Emissions

But according to a study published by the "New York Times" recently, the annual carbon emissions from electricity required to mine Bitcoin, and to process its transactions, are equivalent to the amount totally emitted from a country like New Zealand or Argentina.

The study showed that a single Bitcoin mining transaction needs the equivalent of a carbon footprint of 735,121 purchase transactions using a Visa card, or 55,280 hours of watching YouTube, indicating that according to the Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index. , The average price of a Bitcoin mining transaction is $ 16,000.

Complicated process

The study stated that the Bitcoin mining process is complex and is linked to blockchain technology, indicating that the people who mine digital currencies are themselves the protectors of the network. This process is carried out by computer solving mathematical equations, in order to ensure the correctness of transactions, and thus Manufacture of new currencies.

She added that the maximum number of "Bitcoin" coins that can be mined is 21 million currencies, explaining that mining is an arithmetic process that aims to document and record the operations that take place between electronic wallets, and then save those operations in portfolios that cannot be confused, which negates the possibility of currency manipulation Digital.

challenge

"All the investments the company makes in the future will be evaluated in part on how it plans to meet the climate challenge," said Lawrence de Fink, CEO of BlackRock, whose company manages $ 9 trillion in funds.

He added, "Perhaps most importantly, investors are asking companies to disclose their carbon footprint, as a group called the Climate Financial Disclosure Task Force is working to establish a global standard that governs mining operations."

Supporters

In addition, the company "Square", founded by the founder of the company "Twitter", Jack Dorsey, has become one of the most supporters of "Bitcoin", as it maintains the cryptocurrency on its balance sheet.

Tesla, which works to curb climate change by reducing carbon emissions, has invested more than $ 1.5 billion of its balance sheet in Bitcoin.

For its part, Square Company has allocated about $ 10 million to invest in new green energy technologies in Bitcoin mining, which aims to accelerate its transition to clean energy, while many companies are working on some unconventional ideas to convert Bitcoin to color. the green.

"CT", an investment company working in the field of cryptocurrencies, said it plans to invest in "Bitcoin mining operations by building stations to generate electricity from wind and solar energy."

Exaggerate

Supporters of the digital currency "Bitcoin" considered that the estimates of its carbon footprint are exaggerated, noting that the computers that extract the "Bitcoin" currencies and help in their mining are connected to an electrical network that uses wind and solar energy.

"We believe that the cryptocurrency will ultimately be fully supported by clean energy, and its carbon footprint will be eliminated, while promoting the adoption of renewable energy sources worldwide," said co-founder of Twitter, Jack Dorsey.

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Mining «Bitcoin» one needs to be

equivalent to the

carbon footprint 735.1 thousand treated for purchase using «Visa».

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