The DOWNFALL of bitcoin

[Dark Sky]

Statistics are factual data. Opinions are opinions. I quoted his data and I disagreed with his opinion. You're trying to make this a big deal when it isn't. Do us both a favour and don't bother following up on this point.


I'm not invested in Bitcoin and I've written 7,500-words articles covering the drawbacks and weaknesses of Bitcoin, amongst other things. Like I said, I can think of a dozen better reasons Bitcoin won't become the default global reserve currency, and have even already created threads on BHW discussing that I thought that stablecoins will likely fill that roll.

I'm not ignoring the drawbacks, I don't consider the environmental damage created by Bitcoin mining to be significantly worrisome, because within the context of global industry irrespective of Bitcoin, it's not.

If you disagree and think Bitcoin mining is a scourge on humanity that will be stamped out by the leaders of the world, fine. But I think you're wrong.


Bitcoin is very far from perfect. Thinking that Bitcoin mining isn't as bad as you say it is != "Bitcoin is perfect".


In the vast, vast, vast majority of countries in the world, Bitcoin mining is hardly even present and has a tiny impact on energy consumption.

In the major hubs of Bitcoin mining globally like the US and China, their ecological impact is fucking enormous anyway.. Bitcoin mining is not making China substantially more of a polluted place and god knows what the infinitesimally small fraction of energy consumption in China goes to Bitcoin mining.

Edit:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_electricity_consumption
China: 7,225,500
Argentina (as a rough guide): 125,030

125,030 / 7,225,500 = 0.017 = 1.7%. Jaw dropping stuff, and that's total global Bitcoin energy consumption. In truth it's probably more like 60,000 assigned to China, or 0.85% of China's total energy consumption goes to BTC mining. They must be on the brink of collapse with that kind of huge drain on their power network.


Countries have illegalised crypto and it's remained in heavy usage. China is a the best example of this too.

But sure, global bans on crypto would push it underground. Maybe like the war on drugs we could have a war on Bitcoin, seeing as how well every other prohibition in history has worked.

Bitcoin wasn't created with the permission of governments, and it's not still in operation because they allow it to be man. They couldn't shut down Bitcoin if they tried, that's the whole point and that's some of the intrinsic value that a lot of people miss when they're busy calling it a ponzi scheme.


https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-02-25/investors-could-add-up-to-1-of-bitcoin-to-mix-jpmorgan-sayshttps://news.bitcoin.com/jpmorgan-investors-1-portfolios-bitcoin-poor-hedge/
Good timing. Dimon has been the longest standing and most fervent mainstream financial detractor from crypto and Bitcoin.

Also you're missing the point that banks are making money from crypto and they're hugely invested in integrating it into their systems. There's not a competition between USD and BTC with regards to banks, they care about making money.


Oh yeah, just like multi-billion dollar hedge funds can't be bankrupted by a bunch of amatuer traders? Could only imagine how badly trying to ban Bitcoin would backfire on the US government, not to mention that global crypto and blockchain innovation would just move to other countries en masse like China and Russia.

Yeah, shit tonnes of institutional wall street investment firms have recently invested in Bitcoin heavily, and the US government which is massively influenced by wall street lobbists is going to then ban Bitcoin?

Sounds more like salty wishful thinking to me than even vague reality bro, honestly.

I don't have energy for a long reply but essentially my points stands with me.

The government can ban bitcoin, just like they confiscated gold. I sure wouldn't be buying it if my government would arrest me for it.

The energy consumption is already big, and will grow bigger the higher the price gets. That's a fact. It's already using more than the Netherlands which is an entire country. That's bad. And saying "yeah but china use so much more" is like saying "well if this guys a criminal then I can be too"

1 bitcoin transaction uses 3x more energy than 100,000 visa transactions. That is inefficient. Massively inefficient in terms of energy. In a world where we are trying to be more efficient, here comes the squad wanting an incredibly inefficient cryptocurrency to be globally adopted.

I don't think you understand how much of a delicate position our planet is in, in terms of global warming. And how bitcoin miners are not going to be running towards clean energy when it will shrink their profits.

And those big institutions who are invested in it, don't you think they'd be the first to know if a ban was coming so they wouldn't be crippled by it?

The banks are more powerful than hedge funds, way more powerful.

And it's not so much that people would stop using fiat currency, it's that money would be drained out of the economy, and the government couldn't control it like they can with fiat currency to encourage people spending or to encourage spending.

That's why bitcoin is so popular, because the governments can't control it for the economy. And that's why the banks/government will be threatened. How will the US cope if their money printing tactics become less and less effective? That's the backbone of their economy.

 

[mr.cj]

Don't see it as a currency.
It was made to be yes but now the world sees it as a store of value.
When you can no longer trust your government and when fiat falls, bitcoin will be there to save you.

 

[Deleted member 1333509]

I don't think you understand how much of a delicate position our planet is in, in terms of global warming.

I don't think you do either mate, if we're being honest.. right?

Anyway, nice to have another chat with you and you put forward some interesting points. All the best

 

[Dark Sky]

Don't see it as a currency.
It was made to be yes but now the world sees it as a store of value.
When you can no longer trust your government and when fiat falls, bitcoin will be there to save you.

Aye but it would be an incredibly scary move to put the control of the economy into the hands of the public. What happens during a financial crisis when everyone has bitcoin, and they need to spend, but everyones to scared to spend? Well the gov would print money, encouraging spending. And they can't print bitcoin, so it would be down to the general public as a whole to recover from a crisis. I don't believe in the general public that much to be honest. Even though a lot of governments are crooked.

 

[Pink Smoke]

I may be wrong but quantum computers could break bitcoin security, there are tons of scientific articles talking about that

Yes they have potential to break certain types of encryption

 

[tb303]

Bitcoin is already using the same amount of energy as the Netherlands. In a few years it will be catching up with China's energy usage.

Why? Well every puzzle is designed to be solved in around 10 minutes. So the more miners, means the puzzles get harder. Which means more miners. Which means harder puzzles.

Bitcoin rises > Miners increase > Puzzles get harder > Bitcoin rises > miners increase > Puzzles get harder.

160 quintillion calculations are being made every second currently. That's 160,000,000,000,000,000,000.

"If Bitcoin were to be adopted as a global reserve currency," he speculates, "the Bitcoin price will probably be in the millions, and those miners will have more money than the entire [US] Federal budget to spend on electricity."

"We'd have to double our global energy production," he says with a laugh. "For Bitcoin."

The two essential features of a successful currency are that it is an effective form of exchange and a stable store of value, says Ken Rogoff, a professor of economics at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and a former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
He says Bitcoin is neither.

With all this in mind, is the downfall of bitcoin imminent? You really think governments will allow this energy use to continue? We are already is a global climate change crisis. And two thirds of bitcoins energy is from fossil fuels.

Even if this wouldn't cause bitcoins downfall directly, governments and banks fear bitcoin. They may well use this angle to force it's downfall.

What's your thoughts on this?

The amount of electricity the bitcoin network uses is irrelevant. What matters is how this energy is generated.

The media loves to push the narrative of China burning coal like there is no tomorrow but conveniently forget that they have an excess of hydro power.
https://www.coindesk.com/chinese-ci...ks-blockchain-firms-to-burn-excess-hydropower
You only have to go back a few months to see it in action. Remember the hash rate drop October last year?
https://decrypt.co/46601/bitcoin-hash-rate-drop-attributed-to-chinese-rainy-season
You can find a similar drop around October for most years so its safe assume there's a large chunk that's from renewables.
https://www.blockchain.com/charts/hash-rate
And then there is Elon Musk. You really think he and the Tesla board didn't consider the environmental side of things before sticking all that money in?

Its just fud that comes around from time to time, it was Ireland or Denmark last bull run,. Scary headlines about a trending subject to get clicks ...surely people on this site get this!

The future is that Bitcoin will push miners towards renewable energy as it will become be the cheapest.

 

[Dark Sky]

The amount of electricity the bitcoin network uses is irrelevant. What matters is how this energy is generated.

The media loves to push the narrative of China burning coal like there is no tomorrow but conveniently forget that they have an excess of hydro power.
https://www.coindesk.com/chinese-city-known-for-bitcoin-mining-seeks-blockchain-firms-to-burn-excess-hydropower
You only have to go back a few months to see it in action. Remember the hash rate drop October last year?
https://decrypt.co/46601/bitcoin-hash-rate-drop-attributed-to-chinese-rainy-season
You can find a similar drop around October for most years so its safe assume there's a large chunk that's from renewables.
https://www.blockchain.com/charts/hash-rate
And then there is Elon Musk. You really think he and the Tesla board didn't consider the environmental side of things before sticking all that money in?

Its just fud that comes around from time to time, it was Ireland or Denmark last bull run,. Scary headlines about a trending subject to get clicks ...surely people on this site get this!

The future is that Bitcoin will push miners towards renewable energy as it will become be the cheapest.

It's not if we can use clean energy my friend.

It's about which ones cheaper, dirty or clean. And at the moment, it's dirty that's cheaper.

If you were mining bitcoin as a business, why would you use clean energy, if dirty energy is cheaper. Assuming you had the mind set of "Well if I switch from dirty to clean, it will make no difference and I'll lose profits"

You catch my drift? It's all about which is the cheapest energy which dictates which energy will be use primarily.

 

[Sristy]

Bitcoin is already using the same amount of energy as the Netherlands. In a few years it will be catching up with China's energy usage.

Why? Well every puzzle is designed to be solved in around 10 minutes. So the more miners, means the puzzles get harder. Which means more miners. Which means harder puzzles.

Bitcoin rises > Miners increase > Puzzles get harder > Bitcoin rises > miners increase > Puzzles get harder.

160 quintillion calculations are being made every second currently. That's 160,000,000,000,000,000,000.

"If Bitcoin were to be adopted as a global reserve currency," he speculates, "the Bitcoin price will probably be in the millions, and those miners will have more money than the entire [US] Federal budget to spend on electricity."

"We'd have to double our global energy production," he says with a laugh. "For Bitcoin."

The two essential features of a successful currency are that it is an effective form of exchange and a stable store of value, says Ken Rogoff, a professor of economics at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and a former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
He says Bitcoin is neither.

With all this in mind, is the downfall of bitcoin imminent? You really think governments will allow this energy use to continue? We are already is a global climate change crisis. And two thirds of bitcoins energy is from fossil fuels.

Even if this wouldn't cause bitcoins downfall directly, governments and banks fear bitcoin. They may well use this angle to force it's downfall.

What's your thoughts on this?

Trump was against it earlier. In the future, expecting some more governments to come up with their own digital currencies and ban private ones. China might be starting it..

 

[tb303]

It's not if we can use clean energy my friend.

It's about which ones cheaper, dirty or clean. And at the moment, it's dirty that's cheaper.

If you were mining bitcoin as a business, why would you use clean energy, if dirty energy is cheaper. Assuming you had the mind set of "Well if I switch from dirty to clean, it will make no difference and I'll lose profits"

You catch my drift? It's all about which is the cheapest energy which dictates which energy will be use primarily.

So you'll just ignore the excess hydro energy and the miners blatantly switching when this is off season?

Are you sure you are not wanting to believe this years old FUD just to prop up your "call" of the top?

Post a Tether thread next

 

[Dark Sky]

So you'll just ignore the excess hydro energy and the miners blatantly switching when this is off season?

Are you sure you are not wanting to believe this years old FUD just to prop up your "call" of the top?

Post a Tether thread next

Is hydro power cheaper than coal? I'm not sure what you was getting at. Forgive my ignorance but were you saying that they have an excess of hydropower but deliberately use fossil fuels?

 

[startpool]

I agree with your viewpoint. Its a waste of (huge) resources for something that is as simple as verifying transaction, non-physical puzzle solving competition
Better be allocated to light up the whole world, still many place on earth sitting in darkness at night

 

[tb303]

Is hydro power cheaper than coal? I'm not sure what you was getting at. Forgive my ignorance but were you saying that they have an excess of hydropower but deliberately use fossil fuels?

During the rain season in china there is excess hydro power so that is a lot cheaper (see that link I posted). Its obviously seasonal so Im not saying its all green but pointing out that a large part is for a large part of the year. Just how much can be seen in the amount the whole networks hash rate drops every October as they switch over to coal for the months that its cheaper. China will increase their renewables as we all will have to so if three halvings from now the headlines read Bitcoin uses 51% of available electricity it wont matter if its all coming from solar. The price of bitcoin could even speed up that process.

 

[Dark Sky]

During the rain season in china there is excess hydro power so that is a lot cheaper (see that link I posted). Its obviously seasonal so Im not saying its all green but pointing out that a large part is for a large part of the year. Just how much can be seen in the amount the whole networks hash rate drops every October as they switch over to coal for the months that its cheaper. China will increase their renewables as we all will have to so if three halvings from now the headlines read Bitcoin uses 51% of available electricity it wont matter if its all coming from solar. The price of bitcoin could even speed up that process.

Why would someone pay for renewable energy when fossil fuel energy is cheaper though?

 

[KZX]

If you want to inform yourself about Bitcoin and energy consumption better read this Twitter thread

https://twitter.com/x/status/1346813481257984001

 

[KaleidoJack]

Funny I asked a similar thing just yesterday I believe about crypto being a horrendous energy sink and terrible for the environment. I got some really interesting replies counterting that idea on a reddit post I made.

Here is one of the articles they posted rebutting that and going really into great depth about its benefits and future.

https://danhedl.medium.com/pow-is-efficient-aa3d442754d3
Also

https://braiins.com/blog/a-summary-of-bitcoins-energy-consumption-debate

Thanks for sharing these articles. The first one was pretty good.

 

[KaleidoJack]

We should go back to the basics for a moment, btw.

Doubling or tripling the global energy usage is a good thing. If we could double our energy production every year, that would be fantastic. Our goal is to progress technologically and to expand into outer space. We need all the energy we can get to accomplish this.

OP is not megalomaniacal enough. It's OK. Nobody is forcing him to use bitcoin. If he is so inclined, he can emigrate to Siberia and live a life free of mass energy consumption there.

OP is essentially asking us to halt all progress. But that's not gonna happen. It's too late now. There's literally nothing you can do now to stop bitcoin's impeding general adoption. If one country decides to ban bitcoin, several others won't. Oh, and if bitcoin uses more energy than Argentina, maybe it's because bitcoin is bigger than Argentina, too.

Besides, the more energy is used to power bitcoin, the safer it is. So as far as bitcoin is concerned, that's actually great news.

As for pollution, we are aware of the problem and are doing all we can to reduce it. But your fears that this will stop bitcoin's general adoption are not grounded in reality. Check this out:

https://www.weny.com/story/43255512...nds-to-opposition-in-bitcoin-mining-expansion




BTC is actually good for the environment. At this point, the argument that BTC uses too much energy will have as much effect on the trend as a small rock placed in front of a train marching at full speed will have on its course. All we're waiting for now, is for another two or three large institutions to announce they'll add bitcoin to their balance sheets, and that's it. It's still early, but we're very near the point of no return.

Again, unless you're an activist, I don't really see the point in these fears, really. Or you're afraid of the activists? Well, that's a valid fear, as we can see in the above statement. We could see a new 12-year-old Greta crying about bitcoin's energy usage in the news. But then the miners would just move to countries where there are no Gretas lol.

Man, I'm really bullish on BTC.

 

[ripmyfriend]

Bitcoins is the future.
Buy bitcoins.

 

[Dark Sky]

We should go back to the basics for a moment, btw.

Doubling or tripling the global energy usage is a good thing. If we could double our energy production every year, that would be fantastic. Our goal is to progress technologically and to expand into outer space. We need all the energy we can get to accomplish this.

OP is not megalomaniacal enough. It's OK. Nobody is forcing him to use bitcoin. If he is so inclined, he can emigrate to Siberia and live a life free of mass energy consumption there.

OP is essentially asking us to halt all progress. But that's not gonna happen. It's too late now. There's literally nothing you can do now to stop bitcoin's impeding general adoption. If one country decides to ban bitcoin, several others won't. Oh, and if bitcoin uses more energy than Argentina, maybe it's because bitcoin is bigger than Argentina, too.

Besides, the more energy is used to power bitcoin, the safer it is. So as far as bitcoin is concerned, that's actually great news.

As for pollution, we are aware of the problem and are doing all we can to reduce it. But your fears that this will stop bitcoin's general adoption are not grounded in reality. Check this out:

https://www.weny.com/story/43255512/greenidge-generation-responds-to-opposition-in-bitcoin-mining-expansion
View attachment 164945



BTC is actually good for the environment. At this point, the argument that BTC uses too much energy will have as much effect on the trend as a small rock placed in front of a train marching at full speed will have on its course. All we're waiting for now, is for another two or three large institutions to announce they'll add bitcoin to their balance sheets, and that's it. It's still early, but we're very near the point of no return.

Again, unless you're an activist, I don't really see the point in these fears, really. Or you're afraid of the activists? Well, that's a valid fear, as we can see in the above statement. We could see a new 12-year-old Greta crying about bitcoin's energy usage in the news. But then the miners would just move to countries where there are no Gretas lol.

Man, I'm really bullish on BTC.

You've completely missed the point.

2/3 of bitcoins energy use currently comes from dirty energy. Not clean energy.

That means bitcoin is harming the environment, quite considerably, as it is. It's not good for the environment at the minute. That is a fact.

Saying "Yeah but it has the potential" is like saying "yeah china can be green, but let them carry on as they are, one day they will be green"

The problem is, we are already failing to meet the paris agreement targets to prevent going above the 1.5 degree temperature. Now the UN has come out and said it's probably impossible to meet that now even if we tried.

We are failing as it is to meet the deadlines. Now you want to throw bitcoins dirty energy on top? That's the issue.

 

[KaleidoJack]

2/3 of bitcoins energy use currently comes from dirty energy. Not clean energy.

That means bitcoin is harming the environment, quite considerably, as it is. It's not good for the environment at the minute. That is a fact.

The solution to this problem is very simple. Governments taxing the dirty energy. The bitcoin miners will then move to the cheapest energy sources (which would be the cleaner ones in this solution).

See? Wasn't that easy? So what's your problem again?

 

[Deleted member 283687]

okay