I’ve heard Andreas present these arguments many times. I’ve also heard many others claim the exact opposite (the latter way more often, tbh). So far, I’ve still been unable to make up my mind.

His reasoning in the video is: 1. The cheapest electricity is the one created by renewable energy that’s produced in excess of demand (because you can’t turn it off). If you can use that to mine Bitcoin, you end up supporting green energy.

If it were true, this would be a great argument. If it’s true for 1% of the energetic consumption, while 99% is produced from burning coal, it’s worthless. If it’s the other way around, things change again. Is there a way to figure out which is true?

2. The energy consumption of Bitcoin is way more obvious than the one of the system you use with your credit card. What about the data centers (including all the processing power spent on fraud defection), bank clerks, office buildings, armored cars, ...?

I have no idea how this compares, and I’m not sure it’s a valid comparison unless it’s broken down to a cost per transaction. But it’s true that we don’t have that number for the traditional financial system (AFAICT)

3. There is no other mechanism, apart from a PoW blockchain, that meets the same set of requirements. Maybe the world needs just one global PoW blockchain and the rest can be PoS or something else.

If this is true, Bitcoin may turn out to be that one. That’s a big if, but probably true simply because of the lead it has. I agree with the requirements part, but I’m not convinced it’s worth the cost (which is of course the point of this discussion).

4. Bitcoin can fulfill an increased global load without (linearly?) increasing its energy consumption.