Topic: Could eco-friendly pools like Terra Pool end the energy consumption discussion? - page 2. (Read 229 times)

Using renewal energy only , would end the carbon footprint issue,
but it would not end the issue of driving of energy prices for everyone else on that specific power grid.
Which leaves one of the major reasons PoW mining gets banned.

Reference: https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/16/17128678/plattsburgh-new-york-ban-cryptocurrency-mining

While Bitcoiners don't like PoS, so far it is the only solution that fixes all of the energy waste issues.

There was once mention of work being done on a new PoW design that used light instead of electricity,
I have heard nothing about that for years, so I guess it failed.

The only solution that seems possible with PoW, is regulations limiting who can mine , and how much electricity they are allowed to use.
Once that happen , bitcoin would be a centralized system, which I would hope even the most die hard PoW supporter can recognize PoS is a much better solution than centralized regularization and full government oversight , as Bitcoin would be no better than fiat then.

Fact is that everything will be forced to change and use more renewable energy and not just Bitcoin, for example many European countries will totally ban gasoline and diesel cars by 2030.
In theory many coal power plants will be closed and replaced with hydro, nuclear or other power sources, and I don't think that 1% of energy used by Bitcoin is such a big deal if we look at global picture, but it looks much bigger if media and social media are talking about it all the time.

We are probably not going to achieve 100% renewables-based mining any time soon, China is spending 99% of energy for all kinds of shit that is not related with Bitcoin and big part of produced energy is wasted anyway, but who cares about that right

I am not saying making more eco friendly mining pools is bad, but we should address the source of the problem and that is not Bitcoin.
Much more pollution is created in process of creating Lithium batteries that power electric cars, and that cars are again using energy from coal power plants, so it's much worse then it looks on first sight.
I think that bitcoin mining is like a living organism and it will adapt to whatever conditions and regulations are in the world, but we should be ready for even worse Bitcoin fud in future.

It is not so much about the source of energy that most people like Elon are discussing,,, rather the amount of energy.

As it is pointed out by some people, even using electric cars in some countries is pointless because the source of power is from coal plants,,, so the energy is never clean in some countries.

Restricting your pool to miners that can prove their electricity is from renewable sources will only ensure that the pool is small. It won't prevent miners who can't prove it from joining a different pool or even making their own pool.

BTW, how many miners can control the source of their power? If you get electricity from a distributor then you can't guarantee that the power is from a renewable source.

A step in the right direction to prove that a certain percentage of Bitcoin miners are using renewable energy but I imagine the chinese miners aren't really interested in things like this. Regulations is far more lax there, as you can imagine why.

How about the opportunity cost? Would the renewable energy have been used for uses other than mining and thereby reducing the reliance on renewable energy? I think it would be a far better viewpoint (and perhaps a counterpoint that opponents of PoW would use). Elon Musk has been pretty active on Twitter and loads of people have been convincing otherwise, to not much effect.

Energy consumption (above all, of fossil fuel like coal) is still one of Bitcoin's major disadvantages and if nothing changes, there will be sure more price turbulences like those caused by Elon Musk's tweets last week.

But there is hope that soon the situation could change significantly in the near future.

In March, there was an interesting announcement in the mining industry: Two mining companies, DMG and Argo, are joining forces to build the first mining pool based on renewable energy, called Terra Pool.

Only companies using hash power coming from renewable energies will be admitted in Terra Pool. According to statements of Argo in late April, the pool should be operative by the end of the quarter (thus, in June). Mostly they will be using hydroelectric power, Argo just three days ago purchased data centers in Canada to operate mining equipment based on hydropower.

If this pool is successful, I can imagine a chain reaction, with several mining companies to join Terra Pool or other similar initiatives. While they may have still small price advantages using energy from old coal-based power plants, joining a "green" pool can give them advantages like a regulatory certainty, and the price advantage is smaller every month due to the constant price decrease of renewable energy generation equipment. Remember that the U.S. State of New York introduced stricter regulations for the eco-friendliness of mining companies, and similar regulations could follow in other regions.

Maybe even Chinese pools could follow the example, as there are also regulation attempts in this region. And once we achieve 100% renewables-based mining, then the whole "energy consumption" discussion will stop.

What do you think? I think someone should tweet Elon Musk about Terra Pool and similar initiatives