[anchpop]

transactions on bitcoin cost basically 0 energy too. the bitcoin energy expenditure is from block creation, which is independent from transactions.

Of course, bitcoin transactions incentivize block creation, but gold transactions also incentivize gold mining to some degree.

[tromp]

Bitcoin energy expenditure is not entirely independent from block creation. Transaction fees already make up a nontrivial fraction of the block reward and can be expected to dominate block subsidy within a few decades as the latter keeps halving every 4 years.