Environmentalists are tackling BTC mining again

Several leading environmental groups have addressed a joint call to the US White House to enforce restrictions on Proof of Work (PoW) cryptocurrers, led by BTC, claiming their activities have a negative impact on our planet.

Organization Evironmental Working Group, Earthjustice, Greenpeace, League of Conservation Voters, Sierra Club, Friends of the Earth, Seneca Lake Guardian a Milwaukee Riverkeeper they urge the White House and US President Joe Biden to adopt a policy of electricity and pollution on the planet “during cryptocurrency mining.

The organization said in a joint letter that cryptocurrency mining in the United States is damaging communities by creating “growing demand for fossil fuel electricity, threatening supply chains with integrated circuit demand, generating significant electronic waste, and not helping the transition to renewable energy.”

We just sent a comment letter with the @CleanUpBitcoin coalition and allies to the @WhiteHouse calling on @POTUS to rein in electricity-intensive Bitcoin mining to meet our climate goals.

It's time to #ChangeTheCode!https://t.co/w5PQuulJSn

— Greenpeace USA (@greenpeaceusa) May 10, 2022

The group subsequently proposed that the Environmental Protection Agency subject BTC and other PoW cryptocurrencies to a “rigorous audit” of operating permits to “mitigate the damage caused by large-scale cryptocurrency disposal.”

Regulatory Office for Management and Budget they subsequently called for a register of such companies to be required to publish data on their energy sources and the amounts of energy they consume in their activities.

However, the largest request from this group has been addressed Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) a Commodity Futures Commission (CFTC), who jointly called for crypto-exchanges, in free translation, not to cryptocurrencies on their platforms that have a negative environmental impact. This can also be understood by indirectly requesting that cryptocurrency exchanges withdraw BTC or ETH from their offerings, as these two cryptocurrencies are the largest PoW cryptocurrencies in circulation.

“We require registered exchanges to only offer digital assets whose transactions consume electricity below a certain energy efficiency standard, which would encourage innovation or transition to other forms of validation.” claims environmental groups that indirectly suggest that BTC should move to a less energy-intensive Proof of Stake (PoS) consensus.

Ripple co-founder initiative Chris Larsen recently called for a similar move. The topic of BTC’s transition to Proof of Work has also been debated in the European Union. However, from the point of view of the BTC community, this is nonsense, because leaving PoW would de facto remove the main security element of the entire network, and thus confidence in BTC would rapidly decline.

BTC Mining Council an association that covers the largest BTC miners, mainly in North America, who are estimated to control about half of the hashrate network, has responded to a similar claim on May 2 with an open letter stating that critics of BTC mining are in some key respects mistake – the association pointed out, among other things, that much of BTC’s current production is driven from green sources and also mentioned that BTC production could in some cases even contribute to a greener future – for example, burned and the use of bio-waste, which is associated with even more harmful methane.