Archiving a Comment: Does Blockchain/Crypto Use Too Much Power?
Tl;dr: "Power usage? Not as high as environmentalists claim, but it's something that could be improved upon."
In my research for my article on Square Enix's first NFT. I thought about the power usage of Hive network and how it compares to bigger blockchains...
So I asked around the @ocd Discord server. I think my comments there (detailing my stance on this topic) are worth archiving to leave a record in case I ever changed my opinion.
I have a question... Hive needs witnesses to run right? They're doing the job miners do to the Bitcoin... right?
Does that mean, the total power needed to run Hive network can be calculated by listing all the witnesses, and knowing how much power they consume to run their rigs? Or does other factors come into play?
I thought about this to answer the question I found "Is Crypto bad for the environment" and I thought, "Maybe, but only the ones using POW (Proof of Work) system..."
This was answered fairly quickly, (by @derangedvisions, I believe,) that "Yes," that's basically how would the power usage of Hive be calculated, though he made me realize that it's more than the witnesses rigs being in the play.
It does get a bit more complicated when you factor in backup witness nodes, and the different type of servers they are all running.
The conversation continued with other people, to the topic of whether crypto is actually bad for the environment. So here's what I said regarding that:
I think it's all in the perspective... There are many, many more things more harmful than Crypto, but some people will argue that some of these things are worth the cost.
For people who can't see the value of crypto, I think it's an okay mindset to have... Other than decentralization, it can feel like a higher cost Paypal.
Or in Hive's case, a higher cost social media.
For people who were never damaged by centralized entities and don't fear of getting damaged by them in the future. Decentralization wouldn't seem cost-effective for them.
Sadly I don't see it that way...
When governments do their jobs right, only criminals have to worry, but unethical things have become lawful, and some ethical things have started to become crimes. Good people have a reason to worry these days!
Big companies have too much power! They're aiming to claim even more of that power. It's okay when they don't misuse it, but they own all the platfroms! We already see how one mistake in one platform can ruin someone's life in all of them. The damage even extends that person's daily life!
On the other hand, I see the problem with Proof of Work. It uses too much Power and some regions have banned cryptocurrency mining because of it. (I'm not against the technology here, just that the incentive have grown to a point it becomes it wasteful in my opinion.)
- Can you argue that PoW doesn't cost more power than it should? Please tell me what you think in the comments.
There are other systems cryptocurrencies use for inventive, and they're more eco-friendly. Ethereum is (slowly) moving into the lower cost "Proof of Stake."
Hive is already using its own version called DPoS. This post is on Hive is a proof, It doesn't cost massive power to run it, (at least at the time of writing.) So, I know this problem will be solved eventually.