Block Chain Summit Asked To Address Bitcoin’s Potential Power Drain

(Original source The Business Journals)

Richard Branson this week kicked off the Block Chain Summit, a gathering of leaders in the cryptocurrency community at his private Necker Island.

Coinciding with the event, Australian sustainability think tank the Long Future Foundation released a tool to calculate the electricity required to mine bitcoin. The numbers are massive, and the Foundation’s creative director, Guy Lane, says something must be done.

“If bitcoin’s energy consumption isn’t reined in, we’ll end up being crowded out of electricity networks and sitting in the dark,” said Lane in a statement released today. “So long as people can make money from mining bitcoins, people will spend large amounts of money, resources and electricity to acquire them.”

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