Bitcoin mining may slow climate change.

 Bitcoin mining may slow climate change

The main media narrative around Bitcoin has been that it is an energy-hungry digital asset that is utilized for speculation. In surveys comparing Bitcoin's energy consumption to that of other nation-states, organizations ranging from local governments to the World Economic Forum (WEF) have hailed Bitcoin's energy usage as a significant driving element of climate change. 

More than half of Bitcoin's entire hash rate moved outside of China when a contentious mining ban there was implemented in 2021, which served to support this story. Bitcoin managed to develop quite a bad reputation among environmentalists, with other nations and provinces inside China following suit.

The mining sector has been retaliating against these largely unfounded charges, though. Bitcoin miners have been putting a lot of effort into using methane as a weapon in the fight against climate change.

Bitcoin, methane, and climate change

An oil drilling byproduct really poses a greater threat to the environment than carbon dioxide emissions, which are currently thought to be the main polluters. 

Methane gas is often found in the earth when fossil fuel firms drill for oil. Methane is a highly strong greenhouse gas that when released into the atmosphere causes devastation to the environment. 

Companies have three choices if they find methane near oil drilling: they can either remove the methane or inject it back into the ground. Although it is sometimes possible, reinjecting gas underground maintains the pressure that forces oil out of wells. Few oil wells are located close enough to an existing pipeline to be able to use it, and building a new pipeline is nearly never economically feasible. 

Accordingly, the vast majority of the gas present on oil fields either burns off or is released into the environment. Significant volumes of carbon dioxide are released into the atmosphere when the methane is burned, or flared. It's still terrible for the environment even though it's a little better than pure methane.

A select few creative businesses saw Bitcoin as the logical answer. 

Right now, a number of businesses are selling what is effectively a plug-and-play Bitcoin mining farm that can be installed right on oil fields. Any methane that is discovered in the field is then pumped into a specialized engine or generator, where it is burned to produce electricity, which is then utilized to power Bitcoin miners.

For oil and gas firms, mining Bitcoin effectively makes it economically viable and potentially extremely profitable for them to burn their methane. And with a financial incentive as alluring as Bitcoin, the sector anticipates that an increasing number of big businesses will seize the chance. 

This wasn't always the case, according to Adam Ortolf, Upstream Data's head of U.S. business development. In the past two years, the business of Canadian company Upstream, which produces and provides portable mining solutions for oil and gas facilities, has skyrocketed. According to Ortolf in an interview with CNBC, it has taken the business years to persuade consumers that utilizing extra methane to mine bitcoin is a wise financial decision.

According to Giga, a different firm that provides a comparable service, revenue for 2021 was over $4 million, and by the end of 2022, it was expected to reach over $20 million. Additionally attempting to monetize waste methane through mining are Crusoe Energy, Vespene, and Norther Immersion. 

The innovative concept has caught on like wildfire, inspiring major corporations like Exxon to start their own pilot programs to use waste gas to mine Bitcoin. Throughout 2021, Exxon is allegedly using natural gas to power Bitcoin mining operations in North Dakota, but the company has said nothing about this.

Bitcoin mining on oil fields is said to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 63% compared to flaring, according to a Crusoe Energy research. Methane is thought to warm our climate 84 times more than carbon dioxide over the course of 20 years. Experts and organizations from all around the world, including the EPA, Trillium Energy, Carbon Credits, and the White House, view burning the methane that would have otherwise been released into the environment as having a net positive impact on climate change. 

The administration of President Joe Biden published a report on cryptocurrency mining in September 2022, noting that employing cryptocurrency mining to catch vented methane can have a favorable impact on the environment.

According to a research from BatCoinz, the carbon footprint of mitigating flared and vented methane completely cancels out the carbon footprint of nearly all other energy sources. Some even claim that the Bitcoin network could reduce world emissions by 2% in just 27 months if all of the recorded flared and released methane in the U.S. were utilized to power bitcoin miners. 

Troy Cross, a fellow at the Bitcoin Policy Institute, discussed Bitcoin's impact on the environment during a keynote address at Bitcoin Amsterdam, one of the biggest Bitcoin conferences in Europe this month. Cross acknowledged the benefits of Bitcoin mining while presenting practical ways to use it to reduce the effects of methane pollution.

Those who argue against Bitcoin's impact on climate change should consider the fact that it might become carbon neutral as early as 2024.

Article Credit: Cryptoslate

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