[unreal37]

What do you think about computers that are always on 24/7? Or TVs that never turn off (even if the screen is off)?

(ETA: 23% of household energy use is by always-on devices. The scale of this waste is MASSIVE.)

Devices in our life consume energy 24/7 when we're not even using them or needing them to be on. Energy conservation has a LONG way to go.

In fact, one could argue that the current stock market system is a huge waste of energy compared to the benefit it actually brings to "raising money for companies".

[PragmaticPulp]

Two wrongs don't make a right.

Yes, unnecessary energy waste of other devices is bad and should be reduced. Fortunately, we're making strides to reduce electronics inefficiency all of the time.

Proof-of-work cryptocurrencies are uniquely bad because they become less efficient with each additional miner. The maximum number of Bitcoin transactions was the same a decade ago as it is now, but the energy consumption is many orders of magnitude higher and continues to increase.

When someone adds an additional server to a server rack or buys a new laptop, we also get a net increase in value. The new technology is likely to be more efficient, so we get a net increase in efficiency. Proof-of-work is the only technology that gets worse and worse over time, and literally pays people to continue making it worse.

[Fede_V]

We should do a much better job of building energy efficient devices, but, the amount of energy that's "wasted" by things like TVs that never turned off is really tiny compared to the energy footprint of the crypto ecosystem.

Further, I worry that crypto will grow massively. If that happens, all bets are off. In its current state, crypto consumes more energy than several large countries - imagine a world where that's 10x or 100x and we've still not moved off of proof of work. What's global warming going to look like?

[unreal37]

"A study by the Natural Resources Defense Council found that the energy use from Always On devices across the US accounts for 23% of power consumption in the average household, or a quarter of any given electricity bill. Our own research confirms this."

23% of energy used by households is by always on devices.

Not "tiny".

[mmanfrin]

Idle CPU !== full-blast GPU.