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The energy used by Ethereum has nothing to do with contracts, it's all in the PoW. The reason it uses less energy than Bitcoin is because the block reward[1] pe

The energy used by Ethereum has nothing to do with contracts, it's all in the PoW. The reason it uses less energy than Bitcoin is because the block reward[1] per unit of difficulty is less. That's the real determinant for energy used, the more money you can earn for mining a block the more you can afford to throw at the task of mining it. The block reward is only loosely related to popularity, in that more transactions trying to get into blocks will increase fees and demand for ETH will increase price. But as the sibling comment already pointed out Ethereum is more "popular" than Bitcoin by many counts. [1] reward being: (block subsidy + fees) * price

camgunz 5y ago
> The energy used by Ethereum has nothing to do with contracts, it's all in the PoW. Processing smart contracts requires processing power, which requires energy. > the block reward[1] per unit of difficulty is less. That's the real determinant for energy used Doesn't this go out the window as ETH's price goes up? Also EthHash requires a lot more energy than Bitcoin's SHA-256 (this [1] says SHA-256 is in the Th/s where the latest EthHash ASIC is in the Gh/s), so if the dinosaur BTC dies and ETH takes its rightful place, aren't things much worse? [1]: https://en.cryptonomist.ch/2019/06/15/mining-algorithms-proof-of-work/ https://en.cryptonomist.ch/2019/06/15/mining-algorithms-proo...
- jallen_dot_dev 5y ago
  > Processing smart contracts requires processing power, which requires energy. My point is the energy used to process smart contracts is so small compared to the energy used to find a low block hash, it rounds to 0. Also, if we're comparing to Bitcoin, then by that same token Bitcoin also requires energy to process its "smart contracts" (ScriptPubKey/ScriptSig scripts, which are just small programs). There is nothing special about contracts in Ethereum. > Also EthHash requires a lot more energy than Bitcoin's SHA-256 More energy to perform 1 hash. But what does it matter how many hashes are performed? What matters is how much energy is used to perform those hashes. If you made the hashing algorithm 10x more efficient you would have 10x more hashes, not 10x less energy spent hashing on the network.
  - camgunz 5y ago
    Yeah I mean, re: smart contracts you can interpret it in 2 ways: 1 other energy usages are so high it's zero, or 2 it's an extremely expensive way to run a distributed program. Either way is bad. Re: hash difficulty, this is a function of the network right, so as ETH mining capacity goes up, difficulty has to go up, increasing energy usage. Everyone's answer to this is "PoS!", but PoS is essentially centralization to the rich.
    - jallen_dot_dev 5y ago
      Right, but you don't have to be rich to participate in PoS. You can stake a small amount in a pool. Just like you don't have to be rich to create a giant mining farm, you can join a mining pool with 1 miner. Actually I think PoS might be more egalitarian than PoW. Even if you can scrape together enough money to buy 1 miner, if you don't have access to cheap electricity you just don't mine. Whereas you can always stake with a small amount regardless of where you are in the world.
      - camgunz 5y ago
        Sure, this is just pooling your resources; the front page of Ethereum's PoS site gives this as an option if you don't have 32ETH. But this is like millennials pooling their resources to buy a house, except in that case you get a house. What do we get if we pool together to run an Ethereum node? The ability to run a slower payment system than the one we already have? The ability to launder money simply and effectively?
        rglullis 5y ago
        Those staking ETH are rewarded with 2%/year, so they are all having some form of savings account. What else does it let you do? - To make transactions with anyone in the world without being blocked by a bank or a financial institution. - To put your resources to use without having limits. If you have a bicycle, you will be able to join a distributed bike-sharing program, fully insured. You will be able to finance micro-credit programs for people in countries without having to go through tons of red-tape or corrupt middlemen. - you will be able to be fully sovereign over your online identity(ies). Think of how easy it is to switch between server hosting providers. As long as you control the domain name, you are not forced to stay with a vendor you don't like. With blockchain identities, you will be able to do the same with service you use. The only thing you are showing with your pseudo-criticism is that you are in quite a privileged position if you are okay with the status quo, and also you have no imagination.

camgunz 5y ago

> The energy used by Ethereum has nothing to do with contracts, it's all in the PoW. Processing smart contracts requires processing power, which requires energy. > the block reward[1] per unit of difficulty is less. That's the real determinant for energy used Doesn't this go out the window as ETH's price goes up? Also EthHash requires a lot more energy than Bitcoin's SHA-256 (this [1] says SHA-256 is in the Th/s where the latest EthHash ASIC is in the Gh/s), so if the dinosaur BTC dies and ETH takes its rightful place, aren't things much worse? [1]: https://en.cryptonomist.ch/2019/06/15/mining-algorithms-proof-of-work/ https://en.cryptonomist.ch/2019/06/15/mining-algorithms-proo...

jallen_dot_dev 5y ago
> Processing smart contracts requires processing power, which requires energy. My point is the energy used to process smart contracts is so small compared to the energy used to find a low block hash, it rounds to 0. Also, if we're comparing to Bitcoin, then by that same token Bitcoin also requires energy to process its "smart contracts" (ScriptPubKey/ScriptSig scripts, which are just small programs). There is nothing special about contracts in Ethereum. > Also EthHash requires a lot more energy than Bitcoin's SHA-256 More energy to perform 1 hash. But what does it matter how many hashes are performed? What matters is how much energy is used to perform those hashes. If you made the hashing algorithm 10x more efficient you would have 10x more hashes, not 10x less energy spent hashing on the network.
- camgunz 5y ago
  Yeah I mean, re: smart contracts you can interpret it in 2 ways: 1 other energy usages are so high it's zero, or 2 it's an extremely expensive way to run a distributed program. Either way is bad. Re: hash difficulty, this is a function of the network right, so as ETH mining capacity goes up, difficulty has to go up, increasing energy usage. Everyone's answer to this is "PoS!", but PoS is essentially centralization to the rich.
  - jallen_dot_dev 5y ago
    Right, but you don't have to be rich to participate in PoS. You can stake a small amount in a pool. Just like you don't have to be rich to create a giant mining farm, you can join a mining pool with 1 miner. Actually I think PoS might be more egalitarian than PoW. Even if you can scrape together enough money to buy 1 miner, if you don't have access to cheap electricity you just don't mine. Whereas you can always stake with a small amount regardless of where you are in the world.
    - camgunz 5y ago
      Sure, this is just pooling your resources; the front page of Ethereum's PoS site gives this as an option if you don't have 32ETH. But this is like millennials pooling their resources to buy a house, except in that case you get a house. What do we get if we pool together to run an Ethereum node? The ability to run a slower payment system than the one we already have? The ability to launder money simply and effectively?
      - rglullis 5y ago
        Those staking ETH are rewarded with 2%/year, so they are all having some form of savings account. What else does it let you do? - To make transactions with anyone in the world without being blocked by a bank or a financial institution. - To put your resources to use without having limits. If you have a bicycle, you will be able to join a distributed bike-sharing program, fully insured. You will be able to finance micro-credit programs for people in countries without having to go through tons of red-tape or corrupt middlemen. - you will be able to be fully sovereign over your online identity(ies). Think of how easy it is to switch between server hosting providers. As long as you control the domain name, you are not forced to stay with a vendor you don't like. With blockchain identities, you will be able to do the same with service you use. The only thing you are showing with your pseudo-criticism is that you are in quite a privileged position if you are okay with the status quo, and also you have no imagination.