But you do need banks to store cash. And the bank better have a secure vault and security guards and cameras and all that.
An elliptic curve key, which is what possession of bitcoin is, is just a large number. To send a bitcoin you need to create a "transaction", and in fact the only aspect of generating a bitcoin transaction that requires energy is the SHA calculation, not something you can do in pencil, the EC math is actually simple enough that a computer is not required.
Also your argument that cash does not require energy does not apply to the cashless society we have become today, when was the last time you actually used cash? Credit cards are useless without electricity.
I have cash in my pocket. I'm not a bank. Therefore you don't need bank to store cash. Simple?
And I use cash on a daily basis.. We're far from being the cashless society you claim we are.
But you can only have so much cash in your pocket. The bitcoin private key is 32 bytes always, regardless of the amount.
For example here is the famous 37 BTC ($500,000+) donation to Andreas Antonopoulos yesterday, this couldn't be done with cash, at least not as seamlessly, inexpensively and quickly:
An elliptic curve key, which is what possession of bitcoin is, is just a large number. To send a bitcoin you need to create a "transaction", and in fact the only aspect of generating a bitcoin transaction that requires energy is the SHA calculation, not something you can do in pencil, the EC math is actually simple enough that a computer is not required.
Also your argument that cash does not require energy does not apply to the cashless society we have become today, when was the last time you actually used cash? Credit cards are useless without electricity.