Javier Hernandez ESG analyst Daniel Batten said on Tuesday that over half of the energy used to power the Bitcoin network is now sustainable. He and onchain analyst Willy Woo created special charts to show how the Bitcoin protocol is advancing in this area.
Investigating Bitcoin Mining and its Effects on the Environment
Environmentalists are having a big discussion about the effects of Bitcoin mining. On March 7, 2023, ESG analyst Daniel Batten shared a special chart with Willy Woo on Twitter. It shows how close Bitcoin is to using only 52.6% sustainable energy, as well as other information like total emissions, emissions per dollar, and emissions intensity.
The ESG analyst Daniel Batten recently showed off some new charts all about Bitcoin that will update automatically. We don’t know the details yet, but more information will be coming soon. Politicians in the U.S., such as Senator Elizabeth Warren from Massachusetts, are growing worried about mining operations related to Bitcoin.
Three senators – Ed Markey from Massachusetts, Jeff Merkley from Oregon and Jared Huffman from California – have proposed a law that calls for an investigation into the effect of cryptocurrencies on our energy sources and the environment. However, many reports about Bitcoin’s environmental impact may not be very accurate.
Alex de Vries runs the blog Digieconomist and works for the Dutch Central Bank. However, some people have said there’s a conflict of interest with this combination. But, many environmentalists and politicians still quote de Vries’ work. Recently, Batten previewed a chart to show his ESG findings and explained them in an article published on February 19th 2023.
In the article, someone talks about Bitcoin Mining and a study by Cambridge University. All the time people are talking about how using Bitcoin can negatively affect our world, but 52.6% of the energy used for it is actually okay for our environment. The person who wrote this article explains more about their research on their website, too.
According to a study by Batten, the amount of zero-emission energy was 7.2% less than what was recorded in BMC data but more than what was reported in the CCAF report from September 2022. Batten figured out how to copy exactly the CCAF report which gave them 37% sustainable energy and then changed those numbers to give a new result.
Batten thinks his model is better until the CCAF counts energy from places without access to power grids and gas mining. According to the report, between September 2022 and June 2023, it’s predicted that Bitcoin will use 4.5% more electric sources with no pollution. At the same time, critics have said that Bitcoin gets its energy from coal unfortunately there isn’t enough evidence supporting this theory according to Batten and CCAF’s research.
Do you think that there will be more use of energy sources like wind, solar and water in the near future for mining bitcoin? Tell us what do you think about this below.
