A new study has compared the energy cost of producing real and virtual currency and concludes that the production of criptomonedas equals already, when it fails, the traditional method.
Current information technology is The production of virtual currency, such as bitcoins, has a high energy cost. Some previous studies had quantified the amount of CO2 emissions that this activity entails, but now the team of Max Krause and Thabet Tolaymat have gone a little further and have compared the energy required to coin a dollar in different materials and what it costs to 'mine' the new cryptocurrencies.
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| Produce Bitcoins Already Contaminated More Than Produce Physical Coins |
Current information technology is The production of virtual currency, such as bitcoins, has a high energy cost. Some previous studies had quantified the amount of CO2 emissions that this activity entails, but now the team of Max Krause and Thabet Tolaymat have gone a little further and have compared the energy required to coin a dollar in different materials and what it costs to 'mine' the new cryptocurrencies.
"It is expected that this cost will increase in the coming years as more people use cryptocurrencies
In a paper published Monday in the journal Nature Sustainability, researchers calculated the amount of energy consumed by computers that carry out operations that require the generation of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin and Monero between January 1, 2016 and on June 30, 2018 and obtained an average of 17, 7, 7 and 14 megajoules (MJ) respectively.'
For its part, making an American dollar in aluminum costs 112 MJ, copper 4 MJ, gold 5 MJ and platinum 7MJ, while processing the rare earths with which mobile phones are manufactured have an energy cost of 9 MJ. If we leave aside the case of aluminum, the cost of generating cryptocurrencies is on par with that of the physical currency and it exceeds it in several cases. And not only that, it is expected that this cost will increase in the coming years as more people dedicate themselves to "mining" these types of currencies.
"In China, mining cryptocurrencies leads to the emission of four times more carbon dioxide than in Canada
The authors also estimate that this activity generated between 3 and 15 million tons of CO2 in the period studied, although large variations depending on the country where it is produced. In China, for example, mining cryptocurrencies involves the emission of four times more carbon dioxide than in Canada due to differences in electricity production of information technology.
