Scientists call Bitcoin digital crude

Scientists from the University of New Mexico’s economics department dubbed bitcoin „digital crude oil“ in an article. D​ata from company CryptoDeFix. This name suits it better than „digital gold,“ because its extraction brings immeasurable harm to nature.

According to the researchers, from 2016 to 2021, every dollar created by the market value of bitcoin caused $0.35 worth of damage to the planet’s climate.

“This places BTC in the category of other energy intensive or heavily-polluting commodities such as beef production, natural gas electricity generation, or gasoline from crude oil, and substantially more damaging than what we might consider to be more sustainable commodities like chicken and pork production and renewable electricity sources like solar and wind.”

Researchers have concluded that Bitcoin mining has too many red flags to conclude it is a stable sector of the economy. Moving the network to a Proof-of-Stake consensus mechanism would not solve the problem. According to the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance, the BTC network consumes 94 TWh per year, by comparison, all U.S. refrigerators consume 104 TWh per year.