Ethereum Could Be Using More Than a Country’s Worth of Electricity – Futurism

A Cryptocurrency Powerhouse

Thus far, 2017 has proven to be a notable year forcryptocurrencies and not just the one most everyones familiar with. While Bitcoin has been on a continuous upward trend, its major competitorEther is following close behind. Despite last weeks flash crash and Sundays fake news market value drop, the price of Ether is back up, opening today (Wednesday) at $282.44. Thatsup by more than 13 percent since markets closed on Tuesday, and its continually going up.

Aside from an increase in market value, Ethereums price per coin is also up. Its reached $300, which is a substantialjump from an initial value of $10 at the beginning of 2017. This is making Ethereum a more attractive option for amateur miners than Bitcoin. Therefore, theres beena surge in Ether mining from homes, using just computer graphics cards to pump new Ether units while at the same time securing the Ethereum blockchain the public ledger of transactions that makes it all possible.

Real-time index from cryptocurrency analysis site Digiconomists founder Alex de Vries shows that Ethereum mining is powered by an amount ofelectricity equivalent to that consumed by a small country.All those household computers turned into Ether miners each have blockchain transactions consuming at least, if not more than,45 kWh of electricity. According to de Vries, the entire Ethereum network could be consuming as much as4.2 Terawatt-hours (tWh) which is only a little bit morethan whats consumed bythe Middle Eastern island of Cyprus.

Still, themethodology behind de Vries index isnt totally exact, and since blockchain isdecentralized, it would be next to impossible to truly ascertain justhow much electricity thesehome-based Ether mining operations are consuming. The estimates do indicate,however, just how energy-intensive cryptocurrency mining has the potential to be. One major reason for this is the power-hungry graphics cards involved. Its ironic that mining cryptocurrencies in order to maintain blockchains which are perhaps the most efficient and secure information ledgers we have is a process thats not particularly efficient.

This may not be the case for long, though. Unlike Bitcoin,Ethereum has plans to move away from its existing energy-intensive mining algorithms. Instead of operating on a Proof of Work model, its building a hybrid one that incorporates Proof of Stake. Simply put, this new protocol could allow an Ether holder to mine just by having their computers connected, Vries explained to Motherboard. In a full Proof of Stake algorithm, energy consumption would become negligible, he added.

Until then, mining for Ether will continue to demand huge amounts of electricity and computing power. Plus, as the price for Ether units continue to increase (with the market value of Ether following with it) more and more miners will bemining for it. Ultimately, they could wind up consuming as much electricity as the price of Ether could support. The question is, is this energy and computing power for digital currency worth it? For the time being it seems that it is,if the growing number of miners are any indication.

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Ethereum Could Be Using More Than a Country's Worth of Electricity - Futurism