Bitcoin’s Potential of Becoming a Zero-Emission Network

A new report shows that Bitcoin has the potential to be a zero-emission network

Self-proclaimed ‘coach of influencers & leaders’ and author of ‘How to Change the World with One Pitch’, Daniel Batten, has come out in favor of Bitcoin mining, following extensive analysis of data from the Bitcoin Mining Council.

Using the data to understand how Bitcoin’s overall carbon footprint could be affected by carbon-negative energy sources, Batten claims that the “entire Bitcoin network can become a zero-emission network.”

According to the report, using stranded methane gas that would otherwise be lost into the atmosphere, for Bitcoin mining is the solution. This process is not new and already a reality on a global level, with a potential of lowering the network’s emissions by 63%, the study concludes.

Desirable Mining

The study used data from multiple flare gas miners such as Crusoe Energy in Colorado, Jai Energy in Wyoming and Arthur Mining in Brazil.

Extrapolating the information, Batten writes that currently 1.74% of the Bitcoin network is powered by carbon-negative sources. Further calculations show that this “1.74% of the Bitcoin network using carbon-negative sources has a –4.2% impact on the carbon intensity of the Bitcoin network.”

The research also stipulates the positive impact on the environment the use of waste gases from animal waste in Bitcoin mining can have.

Bitcoin’s carbon footprint has been a hot topic over the last few years. Coming in defense of the network energy usage, in March of 2021, MicroStrategy’s Michael Saylor clarified:

“Bitcoin miners go to the end of the earth, to the end of the grid. They’re using energy that otherwise would have been wasted. It’s either wasted hydroelectric energy, or for example natural gas wells that are about to be closed in and they either have to close them in or flare them.”