[dosenbrot]

I like the fun-facts on this page: "The amount of electricity consumed every year by always-on but inactive home devices in the USA alone could power the Bitcoin network for 1.8 years" Where is the discussion about the smart home devices using that much energy? This is horrible, thats twice as the Bitcoin network and this is just the USA. I would really like if someone estimate the energy usage (with all trucks and cars and people and companies and buildings and so on) of other things than just whole countries, maybe the "normal" financial system, or plastic bottles or something everyone is using (like idle smart devices).

I think most people missing the main point: Energy is to cheap. Most miners are in China, an they seem to pay nearly nothing for the energy (else they would'nt do it). This would mean they waste Energy on EVERYTHING, not only Bitcoin mining. In Germany I would never even think about mining Bitcoin, since I have to pay 0,35€ per kWh. But if I would buy thousends of miners and waste 5MW of energy, I would have to pay roughtly 0,15€ (maybe even just 0,05€). So wasting energy is profitable, is'nt this strange?

[ashtonkem]

I’ve been getting ads from my power company about “energy vampires” reminding me to turn off or unplug unwanted devices for decades. There is an outrage about that wasted power; you’ve just missed it.

Oh, and we’re getting more efficient about household energy usage every single day. Those always on lights used to be 60W incandescent bulbs, now they’re 6-7W LEDs. The same cannot be said about the Bitcoin network, which is growing in energy consumption.

[positr0n]

I didn't have time to dig in to the sources but I wonder if that fun fact is still true. Back in the day your VCR and TV used to consume a large amount of power in standby. These days a device on standby consumes pennies of power a year. Of course there are a lot more electronics in the average home these days...