Bitcoin Miners Make a Splash: Outdoing New York City in Water Usage

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• The latest report discloses that Bitcoin consumes more water than New York City as 591 billion gallons are expected to be exceeded this year. 
• In 2021, 1,600 billion litres of water was reported to have been consumed by Bitcoin according to the US Geological Survey. 

Bitcoin (BTC) has always been the center of discussions from politics, law enforcement, and investments, to energy consumption. It can be recalled that the negative impact of Bitcoin was recently brought up strongly by some environmental activists, who claim that the digital asset emits 25 to 50 million tons of CO2 annually.

According to another report, Bitcoin alone consumes around 127 terawatt-hours (TWh) annually, higher than the consumption of several countries including Norway. The latest criticism leveled at the digital asset is its consumption of water. 

In the journal Cell Reports Sustainability, an article discloses that Bitcoin consumes more water than New York. Per estimation, the consumption of BTC miners is expected to exceed 591 billion gallons in 2023 alone. In comparison, New York City recorded a consumption of 403 billion gallons in 2022 according to data from the U.S Geological Survey. In 2021, almost 1,600 billion liters of water were consumed by Bitcoin. According to According to Alex de Vries of Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Bitcoin does not need to consume this much water.

You have millions of devices around the world, constantly competing with each other in a massive game of what I like to describe as ‘guess the number’. All of these machines combined are generating 500 quintillion guesses every second of the day, non-stop – that is 500 with 18 zeros behind it.

Report Triggers Argument Between Bitcoin Critics and Proponents

The whole setup of Bitcoin mining is reported to be capital-intensive and requires large data centers which increasingly demand electricity and water usage. The water usage comes into play for the cooling needs of the computer servers. This is done via the use of air conditioning systems in gas and coal fire power plants. It can also be administered indirectly. 

The study explains that each BTC transaction uses water far enough to fill a backyard swimming pool. According to Alex de Vries, this is six million times more than what is used in an average credit card swipe. 

This report has raised arguments surrounding the sustainability of BTC mining. A critic identified as Stephen Diehl took a dig at Bitcoin in response to this study.

Bitcoin is one of the most environmentally wasteful technologies ever conceived. In addition to it being a cult.

Interestingly, a Bitcoin proponent Daniel Batten believes that the whole attack on the asset is wrong. According to him, the indirect measurement of water used via electricity consumption misrepresents the actual water footprint of the digital asset.

For the love of God, in rebutting the provably false claim Bitcoin uses too much water, please do NOT say water is part of a natural cycle so it doesn’t matter. It’s not that simple. You’ll sound ignorant. There’s a simpler reason the Bitcoin and Water attack is wrong.

This report has had little impact on the BTC price as the asset still has a 24-hour price surge of 0.79% and is trading at $43,903.96. 

As of press time, BTC had a 15% weekly gain and a bullish market sentiment with a score of 63/100.