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Its unique in that it is profitable and all the infrastructure is right there, yes, they are co-located with the energy sources and this will increase. The only

Its unique in that it is profitable and all the infrastructure is right there, yes, they are co-located with the energy sources and this will increase. The only roadblock has just been old energy and commodities decision makers being confused about the word bitcoin until they see revenue and sustainability graphs. Other things just aren't profitable and didnt satisfy anything for the energy provider. And again, nobody is looking for other things just for the sake of proving that something else can use less energy because there isn't a problem. Computers with no* emissions are reducing emissions and adding a use for energy that was not otherwise going to be used. It is literally the opposite of the story being peddled by pointing at the amount of power being used. This wasn't available beforehand, it isn't important to anyone if “unique” is too strong of a word or not. *its annoying that I can perceive someone will argue that instead of the rest of the point.

arcticbull 6y ago
There’s no such thing as magical unused energy that for the first time in history can only be harnessed thanks to the magic of blockchain. You can colocate so many useful things with power supplies, like electric metalworks. The mining incentive structure and automatic deoptimization of the algorithm mean that there’s a constant arms race to build faster hashing hardware that lasts a few months and then gets thrown out without improving the performance characteristics of the underlying system. 7 transactions per second costs 620kWh and yields 107g of garbage. Each pair of transactions is like chucking your phone out the window and powering a home for 45 days. Do you see how shameful that is? A Tesla gets 4 miles per kWh, so each pair of transactions - where you scribbled down an IOU into a big multiplayer excel sheet - consumes as much resources as driving round-trip across the United States and throwing your iPhone out when you get back. The crazy thing is there's frequently a big overlap between the crypto enthusiasts and people who you know, believe in global warming and recycling. > And again, nobody is looking for other things just for the sake of proving that something else can use less energy because there isn't a problem. And I bet global warming isn't real either huh? I mean those oil companies aren't looking for alternative sources of energy because there isn't a problem. The reality is economic incentives beat rationality pretty much every time hands down.
- vmception 6y ago
  Transactions doesnt mean “transfers”, it means “database operations”, one type of which is a transfer. Other types of which can include a transfer. So these systems are facilitating many more transfers within their transaction limit. Just a nuance. Mining does reduce pollution for oil companies. Its low infrastructure demands and longer than you expect shelf life does utilize power that was being unused or wasted. This is the crux of your argument and it is not accurate. You got here because you decided you dont like how that power is now being used after misunderstanding that it wasn't being used, and I dont care.
  - arcticbull 6y ago
    > Mining does reduce pollution for oil companies. It is 100% additive. It doesn't reduce pollution for oil companies, at all, in any way. Certainly not when you take into account all the oil consumed to build and deliver all the mining hardware that's turned over to the tune of 12.31kT per year. Fine say you're right. Show me a single study, a single article, a single write-up from a reputable source that shows bitcoin reduces pollution for oil companies. > Its low infrastructure demands... 12.3kT of waste per year means a lot of infrastructure relative to what it provides which is basically nothing. > ...and longer than you expect shelf life Shelf life? > ...does utilize power that was being unused or wasted. No. If that power wasn't being squandered on a multiplayer excel game, it would be used for productive things. The same power cannot be used twice. > This is the crux of your argument and it is not accurate. You got here because you decided you dont like how that power is now being used after misunderstanding that it wasn't being used, and I dont care. It is massively, overwhelmingly less efficient than traditional banking and the generated waste and wasted power is purely incremental. If that entire transaction volume moved to traditional rails, the incremental power required to support it would probably be ~one guy on a stationary bike's worth. VisaNet alone can handle 65,000 transactions per second. 7 is 0.01% of that. For perspective, bitcoin would require, if scaled linearly, 123 Megatons of e-waste (triple the entire world today put together). It would require 700,000TWh or 23X the entire world's output of electricity. It would also emit 333,000 megatons of CO2. More than 10X the entire world's current output. Just to replace VisaNet. Of course it's physically incapable since even wasting that quantity of resources, the total transaction count would still be 7. There's no world in which you can rationalize away that it's drastically, overwhelmingly, mind-blowingly less efficient.

arcticbull 6y ago

There’s no such thing as magical unused energy that for the first time in history can only be harnessed thanks to the magic of blockchain. You can colocate so many useful things with power supplies, like electric metalworks. The mining incentive structure and automatic deoptimization of the algorithm mean that there’s a constant arms race to build faster hashing hardware that lasts a few months and then gets thrown out without improving the performance characteristics of the underlying system. 7 transactions per second costs 620kWh and yields 107g of garbage. Each pair of transactions is like chucking your phone out the window and powering a home for 45 days. Do you see how shameful that is? A Tesla gets 4 miles per kWh, so each pair of transactions - where you scribbled down an IOU into a big multiplayer excel sheet - consumes as much resources as driving round-trip across the United States and throwing your iPhone out when you get back. The crazy thing is there's frequently a big overlap between the crypto enthusiasts and people who you know, believe in global warming and recycling. > And again, nobody is looking for other things just for the sake of proving that something else can use less energy because there isn't a problem. And I bet global warming isn't real either huh? I mean those oil companies aren't looking for alternative sources of energy because there isn't a problem. The reality is economic incentives beat rationality pretty much every time hands down.

vmception 6y ago
Transactions doesnt mean “transfers”, it means “database operations”, one type of which is a transfer. Other types of which can include a transfer. So these systems are facilitating many more transfers within their transaction limit. Just a nuance. Mining does reduce pollution for oil companies. Its low infrastructure demands and longer than you expect shelf life does utilize power that was being unused or wasted. This is the crux of your argument and it is not accurate. You got here because you decided you dont like how that power is now being used after misunderstanding that it wasn't being used, and I dont care.
- arcticbull 6y ago
  > Mining does reduce pollution for oil companies. It is 100% additive. It doesn't reduce pollution for oil companies, at all, in any way. Certainly not when you take into account all the oil consumed to build and deliver all the mining hardware that's turned over to the tune of 12.31kT per year. Fine say you're right. Show me a single study, a single article, a single write-up from a reputable source that shows bitcoin reduces pollution for oil companies. > Its low infrastructure demands... 12.3kT of waste per year means a lot of infrastructure relative to what it provides which is basically nothing. > ...and longer than you expect shelf life Shelf life? > ...does utilize power that was being unused or wasted. No. If that power wasn't being squandered on a multiplayer excel game, it would be used for productive things. The same power cannot be used twice. > This is the crux of your argument and it is not accurate. You got here because you decided you dont like how that power is now being used after misunderstanding that it wasn't being used, and I dont care. It is massively, overwhelmingly less efficient than traditional banking and the generated waste and wasted power is purely incremental. If that entire transaction volume moved to traditional rails, the incremental power required to support it would probably be ~one guy on a stationary bike's worth. VisaNet alone can handle 65,000 transactions per second. 7 is 0.01% of that. For perspective, bitcoin would require, if scaled linearly, 123 Megatons of e-waste (triple the entire world today put together). It would require 700,000TWh or 23X the entire world's output of electricity. It would also emit 333,000 megatons of CO2. More than 10X the entire world's current output. Just to replace VisaNet. Of course it's physically incapable since even wasting that quantity of resources, the total transaction count would still be 7. There's no world in which you can rationalize away that it's drastically, overwhelmingly, mind-blowingly less efficient.