Some in the industry have rejected suggestions that it is directly responsible for any environmental damage.
As of May 2022 letter The Environmental Protection Agency, signed by many of the largest companies, said its operations did not “release” pollutants. “Bitcoin miners have no emissions at all,” he said. “The associated emissions are a function of electricity generation.”
Nic Carter, a partner at a crypto-focused venture capital firm and a The prominent Bitcoin advocate who told The Times he was the lead author of the letter, said he was playing a “language game” when he wrote that Bitcoin mining is emission-free. At the time, he said, he felt the industry was being unfairly singled out.
“Perhaps the most candid point is that we are already fully aware of the emissions associated with utility companies that generate power on the grid,” he said.
Many academics who study the energy industry said that Bitcoin mining was undoubtedly having significant environmental effects.
“They are adding hundreds of megawatts of new demand when we are already faced with the need to rapidly reduce fossil power,” said Jesse Jenkins, a Princeton professor who studies power grid emissions.
“If you’re worried about climate change,” he added, “then that’s a problem.”
Flooding in America
Bitcoin, conceived in 2008, introduced most of the world to the concept of cryptocurrencies. Instead of relying on banks to track the value of accounts, the system publishes transactions on a public ledger called a blockchain. Advocates said cutting out the middlemen would free people from financial institutions, government oversight and fees.
So-called mining is a fundamental part of the system: when a computer guesses correctly, it updates the ledger and collects six and a quarter new Bitcoins. Then the guessing game begins again.
Initially, hobbyists could earn from personal computers, but as the value of each Bitcoin skyrocketed (from less than $1,000 in 2017 to more than $60,000 in 2021), mining became more and more of an industrial endeavor. (The price has since dropped, and at press time, it was about $28,000.)
The only way miners can improve their odds is to add computing power, which requires more electricity. But as the number of attempts increases, the algorithm makes the game more difficult. This has created an energetic arms race.
The scale of the mines can make people in the energy industry gasp. A one megawatt mine consumes more energy each day than a typical US home would in two years. The electricity flowing through a 100-megawatt operation at any given time could power about half the homes in Cleveland, according to federal data.