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I've been wondering about this. Once all the easy to get blocks have been mined, the energy consumption of the network will drop to negligible amounts? Is there

I've been wondering about this. Once all the easy to get blocks have been mined, the energy consumption of the network will drop to negligible amounts? Is there a source out there that explains this and when it will likely happen?

kinghajj 6y ago
No, mining will continue as usual even after the block reward drops to 0. At that point, miners will only receive transaction fees, and not transaction fees + the block reward as they do currently.
- maliker 6y ago
  Does that negate the original poster's point that "Making transactions, relaying them, validating them and storing them have negligible energy cost."?
  - kinghajj 6y ago
    The original poster was being pedantic in distinguishing between "Making transactions, relaying them, validating them" and "block production" (mining). So they are technically correct, but I'd agree that they're being disingenuous. Sure, "making a transaction" is cheap, as well as nodes "validating" transactions in produced blocks. But without mining to make those blocks to be validated, nothing would progress on the Bitcoin blockchain.
    - jude- 6y ago
      No need to talk about me like I'm not here ;) The energy spent on block production is something that, in theory, _could_ be regulated so as to reduce or cap the pollution it may create. We already do this with other industries, like banning CFCs from refrigerants. Why not do the same with mining? But before we can have a serious conversation about this, the folks on this site need to understand that the problem is _using fossil fuels to mine blocks_. It makes no sense to talk about how much electricity a Bitcoin transaction consumes, as if that meant anything. Loading and rendering HN takes more electricity, and no one complains about that.
      - mandelbrotwurst 6y ago
        You are correct that energy consumption that relies on fossil fuels is more damaging than energy consumption that comes from many other sources, but your claim that massive energy consumption means nothing it comes from other sources is not. Even "clean" energy isn't free energy. We need to consider both the costs on the supply side as well as what's driving the demand side for our energy consumption if we want sustainable systems. The costs of running both our Internet as well as the Bitcoin blockchain are components of that, and if we aren't considering them, it's a mistake. The energy costs of the Bitcoin blockchain will become highly significant very quickly if the network continues to grow at the pace that it has to date, even if the work is done by machines relying on energy sources multiple times cleaner than those that currently exist. If we want to alleviate this, I suspect that we'll have to consider what the underlying social factors are that are driving the demand for such a network.
        jude- 6y ago
        > Even "clean" energy isn't free energy. No one said it was. But some energy sources produce far less pollution than others, and are far safer. Also, everything I'm saying about regulating and taxing pollution from PoW applies to every single energy-intensive industry; PoW just happens to be the particular industry at hand. > If we want to alleviate this, I suspect that we'll have to consider what the underlying social factors are that are driving the demand for such a network. This is literally what regulation and taxation could address. If you tax cryptocurrency transactions based on how much pollution their miners create, the problem could fix itself -- miners would then be incentivized to use only clean energy to mine (and prove that they are doing so), since that's the way to stay competitive. Also, because literally every transaction is a public record, a government could (a) require KYC for you to trade crypto -- up to requiring you to register your address(es) -- and (b) send you a tax bill each year for the pollution caused by each block that included one of your transactions. Exchanges operating under its jurisdiction would only let you cash out once you paid that tax. In addition, suitable regulation could require that no more than X% of a utility's electricity can go towards mining (e.g. only during off-peak hours; only if its excess; etc.).

kinghajj 6y ago

No, mining will continue as usual even after the block reward drops to 0. At that point, miners will only receive transaction fees, and not transaction fees + the block reward as they do currently.

maliker 6y ago
Does that negate the original poster's point that "Making transactions, relaying them, validating them and storing them have negligible energy cost."?
- kinghajj 6y ago
  The original poster was being pedantic in distinguishing between "Making transactions, relaying them, validating them" and "block production" (mining). So they are technically correct, but I'd agree that they're being disingenuous. Sure, "making a transaction" is cheap, as well as nodes "validating" transactions in produced blocks. But without mining to make those blocks to be validated, nothing would progress on the Bitcoin blockchain.
  - jude- 6y ago
    No need to talk about me like I'm not here ;) The energy spent on block production is something that, in theory, _could_ be regulated so as to reduce or cap the pollution it may create. We already do this with other industries, like banning CFCs from refrigerants. Why not do the same with mining? But before we can have a serious conversation about this, the folks on this site need to understand that the problem is _using fossil fuels to mine blocks_. It makes no sense to talk about how much electricity a Bitcoin transaction consumes, as if that meant anything. Loading and rendering HN takes more electricity, and no one complains about that.
    - mandelbrotwurst 6y ago
      You are correct that energy consumption that relies on fossil fuels is more damaging than energy consumption that comes from many other sources, but your claim that massive energy consumption means nothing it comes from other sources is not. Even "clean" energy isn't free energy. We need to consider both the costs on the supply side as well as what's driving the demand side for our energy consumption if we want sustainable systems. The costs of running both our Internet as well as the Bitcoin blockchain are components of that, and if we aren't considering them, it's a mistake. The energy costs of the Bitcoin blockchain will become highly significant very quickly if the network continues to grow at the pace that it has to date, even if the work is done by machines relying on energy sources multiple times cleaner than those that currently exist. If we want to alleviate this, I suspect that we'll have to consider what the underlying social factors are that are driving the demand for such a network.
      - jude- 6y ago
        > Even "clean" energy isn't free energy. No one said it was. But some energy sources produce far less pollution than others, and are far safer. Also, everything I'm saying about regulating and taxing pollution from PoW applies to every single energy-intensive industry; PoW just happens to be the particular industry at hand. > If we want to alleviate this, I suspect that we'll have to consider what the underlying social factors are that are driving the demand for such a network. This is literally what regulation and taxation could address. If you tax cryptocurrency transactions based on how much pollution their miners create, the problem could fix itself -- miners would then be incentivized to use only clean energy to mine (and prove that they are doing so), since that's the way to stay competitive. Also, because literally every transaction is a public record, a government could (a) require KYC for you to trade crypto -- up to requiring you to register your address(es) -- and (b) send you a tax bill each year for the pollution caused by each block that included one of your transactions. Exchanges operating under its jurisdiction would only let you cash out once you paid that tax. In addition, suitable regulation could require that no more than X% of a utility's electricity can go towards mining (e.g. only during off-peak hours; only if its excess; etc.).