Nobody Knows How Much Energy Bitcoin Is Using (vice.com)

dmoberhaus writes: A new report published in 'Joule' today claims Bitcoin may use up to 0.5% of the world's energy by the end of this year. We often hear about how bad Bitcoin is for the environment -- it already uses the same amount of energy as the country of Ireland -- but these numbers are usually just the /minimum/ amount of energy the network must be using. The actual amount of energy used by the Bitcoin network is likely substantially higher, but getting an accurate reading on that energy level is hard. The only researcher trying to quantify Bitcoin's energy use spoke to Motherboard about opening Bitcoin's 'black box.'

Comments

Re:But how much energy is used by traditional fiat

[NitroWolf]

I literally do this all the time. Paying in bitcoin is often faster than cash. If it's taking longer, you're doing it wrong, and either YOU or the person receiving it is retarded.