Bitcoin mining, and many other cryptocurrencies, has such a high energy consumption (In 2019, it surpassed that of Switzerland) what or what It has become a worrying environmental problem. Faced with this situation, a group of environmental organizations propose Change the symbol of the main cryptocurrency in the world To make it more energy efficient.
as collected guardianthe Environmental Working Group, Greenpeace and various groups launched a campaign called “Code not the climate(Change the code, not the weather.) Taking the evolution of the ethereum mining mechanism as an example, the organizations claim that “changing software code can reduce Bitcoin’s energy use by 99%.”
Change the code to reduce your carbon footprint
The campaign organizers say that in the wake of China’s crackdown on crypto-mining, the US is leading the way, and what is happening is not necessarily good. Coal plants that were idle or were due to be closed are being reactivated, according to Code Not climate member Michael Brune.
The former CEO of the Sierra Club also said that gas plants, which in many cases are becoming less economically competitive, are also turning to bitcoin mining.” According to the campaignOperations using renewable energies are not enough and The only way to achieve the climate goals is to change the Bitcoin token.
Over the past few years, we’ve seen how some miners have started looking for it Cheap and carbon dioxide free alternativesEven El Salvador has started Mining using volcanic energyBut the problem with bitcoin, according to Chris Larsen, founder of the Ripple Payments project and a member of the environmental group, is that the model naturally leads to “maximum energy use.”
Bitcoin currently uses a mechanism known as Proof of Work (PoW), which is a distributed consensus protocol in which Network segments perform complex arithmeticFirst of all, to confirm transactions and acquire new blocks of the network, which usually consume a large amount of electrical energy.
Let us remember that the interest of many in entering the world of cryptocurrency mining is the rewards. These use their own GPU hardware, although ASICs also exist, to handle complex mathematical problems. And it is a real competition, because the first to solve the “puzzle” gets the cryptocurrency as a reward.
Ethereum, meanwhile, The transition path has begun Towards a mechanism known as Proof of Stake (PoS). The new law promises to reduce energy consumption by 99% By implementing an incentive system that rewards, in general, those who become auditors of the system.
Environmental organizations take what Ethereum is doing as a model to follow and assert that the same result can be achieved with bitcoin, but caution that “stakeholders have incentives not to change” because they will leave a significant amount of valuable infrastructure unused, and the challenge is even greater.
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