The price of Bitcoin nosedived after Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced his company would no longer be accepting the cryptocurrency as payment due to its ties to fossil fuels in a tweet that sparked a heated debate on the digital currency’s environmental impact.
The electric vehicle company chief executive added that Tesla will not be selling any of the Bitcoin it currently holds — which amounts to some $1.5 billion, according to a February SEC filing — but will use it for transactions “as soon as mining transitions to more sustainable energy.”
Bitcoin is made through a process called mining, which involves verifying Blockchain transactions using high-powered computers that solve complex mathematical equations. The specialized computer servers required to mine Bitcoin consume immense amounts of electricity, which in China and other Bitcoin-mining hubs often relies on energy from fossil fuels.
Bitcoin accounts for 0.69% of the world’s total electricity consumption, according to researchers at the University of Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance (CCAF).
Annually, this would mean that Bitcoin mining and transactions consume more energy than the entire nation of Sweden or the Netherlands did in 2019, the researchers noted.
Source-ABC
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