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This is not a convincing argument, but even if it were, carbon recapture is currently even more of a "rounding error" in the grand scheme of carbon emissions. C

This is not a convincing argument, but even if it were, carbon recapture is currently even more of a "rounding error" in the grand scheme of carbon emissions. Current carbon emissions are somewhere around 50 billion metric tons a year. I've seen varying estimates of crypto emissions, so I'm going to cite one [1] on the low end here, since it's more favorable to your argument, but the highest I've seen is less than double this number, so they're all in the same ballpark. ETH currently emits 7.4 million metric tons of CO2 a year. Bitcoin is much higher. I've seen estimates as low as 16 million and as high as 55. There are other chains as well. To keep the math simple, let's round it to 50 million, so crypto is contributing 0.1% of total carbon emissions. Like you said, a rounding error. I think we're just going to have to disagree on mitigations. I don't think they're working very well. Crucially, at the beginning of 2019, according to the source I linked, ETH was only at 2 million tons a year. It's more than tripled since then. In 2021, Carbon recapture removed an estimated 9 thousand tons of CO2. [2] The CO2 from the growth of ETH eclipses anything that carbon recapture is currently capable of. The technology will get better. The most optimistic estimate I've seen is that carbon recapture will hit 30 million tons a year in 2070. But this year, Stripe Crypto only has to increase crypto transactions, across all blockchains it supports, by 9,000 tons to completely offset all of the money it's putting into recapture efforts. Even if you remove all the other chains, Stripe only has to increase ETH transactions by 1.3% to achieve this own-goal. Long term, Stripe alone could end up causing more CO2 emissions on the blockchains to grow faster than all of carbon recapture. 1: https://kylemcdonald.github.io/ethereum-emissions/ https://kylemcdonald.github.io/ethereum-emissions/ 2: https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/worlds-largest-plant-capturing-carbon-air-starts-iceland-2021-09-08/ https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/worlds-largest-...

PretzelPirate 5y ago
On the bright side, Ethereum devs have just launched the final testnet before the switch to Proof-of-Stake. It would be great for Stripe to continue investing the same amount of money into carbon recapture even after Ethereum’s carbon emissions drop over 99%.
- StewardMcOy 5y ago
  As I said in my original post, it would be great if that happened. I'm skeptical proof-of-stake will work at scale. If it does, great, but Stripe should have waited until then to support ETH, and not support Bitcoin or other chains currently on proof-of-work. They damage they're doing in the meantime is more detrimental than their recapture efforts are beneficial.
  - rvz 5y ago
    > If it does, great, but Stripe should have waited until then to support ETH, and not support Bitcoin or other chains currently on proof-of-work. Maybe is that why I see Solana on the front-page of Stripe Crypto? Since that is a blockchain that is not only more eco-friendly [0] and many times faster than both Ethereum and Bitcoin put together but one can use right now today rather than waiting for Ethereum Proof-of-Stake for many years. I am not going to tell merchants to pray on a calendar month when ETH 2.0 will launch. They'll just use other blockchains instead if one was told to 'wait'. [0] https://solana.com/news/solana-foundation-carbon-neutral-2021 https://solana.com/news/solana-foundation-carbon-neutral-202...
    - StewardMcOy 5y ago
      > Maybe is that why I see Solana on the front-page of Stripe Crypto? This would be a great argument if Solana were the only cryptocurrency that Stripe was supporting, or if Stripe was only supporting cryptocurrencies with similar carbon footprints, but the top image above the fold is a screenshot of using Stripe to purchase Bitcoin. ETH and other PoW blockchains are also featured on the page. My core argument is that supporting PoW blockchains does more damage than their carbon recapture efforts reduce. The presence of Solana in the list doesn't invalidate that.
      - rvz 5y ago
        This is your suggestion: > Stripe should have waited until then to support ETH, and not support Bitcoin or other chains currently on proof-of-work. > but the top image above the fold is a screenshot of using Stripe to purchase Bitcoin. ETH and other PoW blockchains are also featured on the page. I'm not the one telling Stripe and merchants to 'Wait for ETH to migrate to PoS' to support crypto payments, just because PoW blockchains still exist and are burning up the planet. Maybe you can tell the CEO of Stripe, (Patrick Collison [0]) to cut support for all PoW cryptocurrencies on Stripe then? So you're also telling me there isn't a choice or a way to avoid PoW cryptocurrencies and only accept PoS cryptocurrencies? Are you also going to tell merchants to close their Stripe accounts because Stripe still plans to continue to support Bitcoin? Outside of Stripe, Bitcoin is still there and burning up the planet. It's not the only cryptocurrency that exists is it? > My core argument is that supporting PoW blockchains does more damage than their carbon recapture efforts reduce. And? Everyone knows that. You can do something about that and not accept and cut support for those PoW cryptocurrencies as a merchant and use eco-friendly alternatives? If Bitcoin was the only cryptocurrency that exists today, then there would be NO choice and that would be a problem, but that is not the case today. The presence of non-proof-of-work cryptocurrencies that exist and are working today like Solana, Algorand and Polkadot tells you that there is choice beyond PoW; even Stripe knows that. [0] https://twitter.com/patrickc/ https://twitter.com/patrickc/
mattdesl 5y ago
Perhaps worth clarifying: emissions are tied to hash rate (and price action), not transaction count which is effectively capped by limited block space. Your post makes it seem that Stripe’s service getting used will quickly increase emissions, but if ETH price and hash rate drops significantly in the coming months, the emissions would also follow suit regardless of transaction count. I agree though, the tech is currently immature and energy inefficient, and Stripe could have committed to PoS chains (eg: Tezos) if they really wanted to avoid bearing any additional emissions responsibility. Personally I am happy to see this service, as I currently have to rather painfully roll my own crypto-commerce stack to support ERC20/ETH as a payment option in my business operations, and I would rather a well-engineered product to remove some of this overhead.
- StewardMcOy 5y ago
  This is correct. I was using transactions as a standin for demand. As in, Stripe could increase the demand for transactions, which increases gas fees, thus enticing more miners to participate, increasing the hash rate.

PretzelPirate 5y ago

On the bright side, Ethereum devs have just launched the final testnet before the switch to Proof-of-Stake. It would be great for Stripe to continue investing the same amount of money into carbon recapture even after Ethereum’s carbon emissions drop over 99%.

StewardMcOy 5y ago
As I said in my original post, it would be great if that happened. I'm skeptical proof-of-stake will work at scale. If it does, great, but Stripe should have waited until then to support ETH, and not support Bitcoin or other chains currently on proof-of-work. They damage they're doing in the meantime is more detrimental than their recapture efforts are beneficial.
- rvz 5y ago
  > If it does, great, but Stripe should have waited until then to support ETH, and not support Bitcoin or other chains currently on proof-of-work. Maybe is that why I see Solana on the front-page of Stripe Crypto? Since that is a blockchain that is not only more eco-friendly [0] and many times faster than both Ethereum and Bitcoin put together but one can use right now today rather than waiting for Ethereum Proof-of-Stake for many years. I am not going to tell merchants to pray on a calendar month when ETH 2.0 will launch. They'll just use other blockchains instead if one was told to 'wait'. [0] https://solana.com/news/solana-foundation-carbon-neutral-2021 https://solana.com/news/solana-foundation-carbon-neutral-202...
  - StewardMcOy 5y ago
    > Maybe is that why I see Solana on the front-page of Stripe Crypto? This would be a great argument if Solana were the only cryptocurrency that Stripe was supporting, or if Stripe was only supporting cryptocurrencies with similar carbon footprints, but the top image above the fold is a screenshot of using Stripe to purchase Bitcoin. ETH and other PoW blockchains are also featured on the page. My core argument is that supporting PoW blockchains does more damage than their carbon recapture efforts reduce. The presence of Solana in the list doesn't invalidate that.
    - rvz 5y ago
      This is your suggestion: > Stripe should have waited until then to support ETH, and not support Bitcoin or other chains currently on proof-of-work. > but the top image above the fold is a screenshot of using Stripe to purchase Bitcoin. ETH and other PoW blockchains are also featured on the page. I'm not the one telling Stripe and merchants to 'Wait for ETH to migrate to PoS' to support crypto payments, just because PoW blockchains still exist and are burning up the planet. Maybe you can tell the CEO of Stripe, (Patrick Collison [0]) to cut support for all PoW cryptocurrencies on Stripe then? So you're also telling me there isn't a choice or a way to avoid PoW cryptocurrencies and only accept PoS cryptocurrencies? Are you also going to tell merchants to close their Stripe accounts because Stripe still plans to continue to support Bitcoin? Outside of Stripe, Bitcoin is still there and burning up the planet. It's not the only cryptocurrency that exists is it? > My core argument is that supporting PoW blockchains does more damage than their carbon recapture efforts reduce. And? Everyone knows that. You can do something about that and not accept and cut support for those PoW cryptocurrencies as a merchant and use eco-friendly alternatives? If Bitcoin was the only cryptocurrency that exists today, then there would be NO choice and that would be a problem, but that is not the case today. The presence of non-proof-of-work cryptocurrencies that exist and are working today like Solana, Algorand and Polkadot tells you that there is choice beyond PoW; even Stripe knows that. [0] https://twitter.com/patrickc/ https://twitter.com/patrickc/

mattdesl 5y ago

Perhaps worth clarifying: emissions are tied to hash rate (and price action), not transaction count which is effectively capped by limited block space. Your post makes it seem that Stripe’s service getting used will quickly increase emissions, but if ETH price and hash rate drops significantly in the coming months, the emissions would also follow suit regardless of transaction count. I agree though, the tech is currently immature and energy inefficient, and Stripe could have committed to PoS chains (eg: Tezos) if they really wanted to avoid bearing any additional emissions responsibility. Personally I am happy to see this service, as I currently have to rather painfully roll my own crypto-commerce stack to support ERC20/ETH as a payment option in my business operations, and I would rather a well-engineered product to remove some of this overhead.

StewardMcOy 5y ago
This is correct. I was using transactions as a standin for demand. As in, Stripe could increase the demand for transactions, which increases gas fees, thus enticing more miners to participate, increasing the hash rate.