Bitcoin’s Shocking Energy Consumption | OilPrice.com

When it comes to thinking about which economic sectors and industry niches that consume the most energy, cryptocurrencies may not immediately come to mind. But for some of these crypto companies, their energy and carbon footprints are not just considerable, they’re massive. The most famous example, Bitcoin, has an annual energy footprint slightly larger than the entire nation of Switzerland. The company’s current energy consumption can be tracked here. 

Last year, the University of Cambridge created an online tool that allows users to compare the boggling energy consumption of Bitcoin to other entities. At the time that this platform debuted, the tool estimated that “Bitcoin is using around seven gigawatts of electricity, equal to 0.21% of the world’s supply,” according to a BBC report. This shocking figure translates to “as much power as would be generated by seven Dungeness nuclear power plants at once.”

How can one company that doesn’t even produce…