Proof of stake is one of the reasons why bitcoin is so valuable in the first place. I’ve seen estimates that the electricity costs combined with the equipment cost makes each bitcoin approximately $20k to mine. Not a bad thing. Anyways, energy is somewhat artificially scarce- can always just pump up more oil out of the ground.
eager_eagle@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Misleading title - the problem is not “crypto”, it’s pretty much all Bitcoin and the people against the change in the consensus mechanism. Out of the top 10 coins in market cap, Bitcoin is the only one using proof of work, which demands such high energy requirements.
Jeknilah@monero.town 7 months ago
Skua@kbin.social 7 months ago
can always just pump up more oil out of the ground.
No, this is actually exactly the fucking problem
Jeknilah@monero.town 7 months ago
No it’s not? The fact that the energy supply can adjust to demand is a good thing rather than a problem. At least in the US. Looked into it, and it seems that there’s an estimated to be over 300 billion barrels of recoverable oil that is mostly economically viable. Compare that to a current annual consumption of 7 billion barrels a year. There’s enough to maintain current consumption for another 40 years. That is most of my remaining lifetime from domestic production alone.
Skua@kbin.social 7 months ago
I have some bad news for you about the environmental effects of burning lots of oil
matjoeman@lemmy.world 7 months ago
As long as there’s enough for your remaining lifetime that’s fine. We don’t have to worry about anyone else’s lifetime after that.
eager_eagle@lemmy.world 7 months ago
you mean proof of work? And I disagree, Ethereum moved from PoW to PoS and gained market cap since then
adrian783@lemmy.world 7 months ago
bitcoin has got to be invented by an alien or something so that we would terraform for them…
Odd_so_Star_so_Odd@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Probably just a fool thinking free fusion energy was just around the corner
wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 months ago
It’s more that it was originally a theoretical white paper meant to present a potential solution for a very specific problem space. Energy use wasn’t a consideration in the design, because that wasn’t part of what it was meant to address. Likewise, anonymity in the sense of hiding transactions wasn’t part of the design either, besides avoiding centralized banking’s requirement that every “wallet” is associated with a government ID.
It was a fun toy meant as a proof of concept solution to centralized banking.
Eventually market speculators saw what the nerds were getting up to, got some ideas, and everything freaking exploded. It wasn’t meant to drive speculative markets.
bigMouthCommie@kolektiva.social 7 months ago
two of the top 10 by market cap ar stable coins.
eager_eagle@lemmy.world 7 months ago
what’s your point?
bigMouthCommie@kolektiva.social 7 months ago
that market cap is a dumb metric to use to dictate protocol specifications
eager_eagle@lemmy.world 7 months ago
wtf are you even talking about? What protocol specs?
Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Want to suggest a better one?
SuckMyWang@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Isn’t it strange no one gave a shit about this a year and a half ago when the price was low? It appears everyone’s concern for the environment and energy consumption only increases when the price goes up. Interesting correlation or may be causation.
Nilz@sopuli.xyz 7 months ago
Everyone already gave a shit about this a long time ago. It’s also one of the reasons Ethereum switched from proof of work to proof of stake.
SuckMyWang@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Yes but only when the price was high did anyone care and ethereum switch. Barely a peep for the last 2 and a half years
fidodo@lemmy.world 7 months ago
I’ve been hearing about the stupid amount of energy usage for years and years. You just created a straw man that isn’t based on reality.
SuckMyWang@lemmy.world 7 months ago
I’ve been keeping a close eye on the news about crypto and there has been virtually no stories about any crypto for the last 2 years. They only started to come back into circulation about 6 months ago. If you remember otherwise you are wrong.
bigMouthCommie@kolektiva.social 7 months ago
dogecoin is top10
eager_eagle@lemmy.world 7 months ago
ah yes the 10th place - still, Doge is estimated to use ~1% of the energy Bitcoin uses.
bigMouthCommie@kolektiva.social 7 months ago
the entire Bitcoin block chain could be run on the phone I'm using to write this. there is nothing inherent to the protocol that dictates such massive power use.
and dogecoin merge mines with all the other script coins so how can you even calculate its independent usage?
FaceDeer@kbin.social 7 months ago
Yes there is, massive power use is the entire point of proof-of-work. If Bitcoin blocks could be produced without massive power use then the blockchain's system of validation would fail and 51% attacks would be trivial.
eager_eagle@lemmy.world 7 months ago
idk their methodology - source
bigMouthCommie@kolektiva.social 7 months ago
>it’s been in steady decline since the meme blew up.
it got a pretty big bump from elon a couple years back, but dogecoin is nearly perfect money. it isn't deflationary, it's cheap to transact, and the on-ramps are ubiquitous.