Bitcoin miners and energy demand
Bitcoin miners are uniquely flexible energy consumers that can help solve several energy problems.
One of them is strengthening increasingly fragile electricity grids
A thread on #bitcoin mining as a demand response
— Jaran Mellerud (@JMellerud) September 8, 2022
IEA estimates a massive growth in non-controllable energy sources as a share of the generation mix from 11% to 42% in 2040.
How do we replace the lost system flexibility?
pic.twitter.com/Y8ML7dvT7g
— Jaran Mellerud (@JMellerud) September 8, 2022
For an energy consumer to serve as a great demand response resource, it must have:
1) Low cost of reacting
2) Quick reaction time
3) High availability
4) High granularityBitcoin mining is the only energy-intensive industry checking all these boxes
— Jaran Mellerud (@JMellerud) September 8, 2022
Low cost of reacting
The cost of reacting refers to a demand response resource's costs of powering down its operations.
For bitcoin miners, the only cost of reacting is the alternative cost of not mining, giving them high economic incentives to provide demand response pic.twitter.com/7UPa9FPP3t
— Jaran Mellerud (@JMellerud) September 8, 2022
Quick reaction time
Reaction time is how fast the demand response resource can power down its operations.
Solving the SHA-256 algorithm can rapidly be
interrupted, allowing bitcoin miners to participate in demand response programs requiring the fastest reaction times.— Jaran Mellerud (@JMellerud) September 8, 2022
High availability
Because of the stability of a bitcoin miner's load, a system operator can always rely on the bitcoin mining load to be available to provide demand response when needed.
— Jaran Mellerud (@JMellerud) September 8, 2022
High granularity
Granularity refers to how many increments the demand response resource can adjust its load.
A bitcoin miner can adjust its load in almost infinite increments and is therefore highly flexible in the amounts of electricity it can sell to the grid
— Jaran Mellerud (@JMellerud) September 8, 2022
Crypto vs. energy consumption
WHITE HOUSE REPORT: CLIMATE AND ENERGY IMPLICATIONS OF CRYPTO-ASSETS IN THE UNITED STATES
It’s not about climate change, it’s about complete and utter control.
Don’t give them one inch. pic.twitter.com/HA4qZSg4XM
— Dylan LeClair
Stop pandering to the ESG narrative. It’s utterly moronic.
If you don’t like how someone is using energy, pay a higher price than them.
Mining enables the buildout of baseload for the grid, and can dynamically shut off during surge demand. No other industry operates similarly.
— Dylan LeClair
Hash rate will continue to march higher.
No amount of hysteric screeching about climate change will stop the next block from being mined.
Education is good, yes, but stop pandering to their disingenuous narratives.
Pandering to communists is the real waste of energy.
— Dylan LeClair
The sides are being drawn. You are either in favor of living in a digital panopticon where every action of your life is monitored and controlled, or your not.
Money is the final boss.
If we don’t reclaim stateless money for the digital age all else is lost. #Bitcoin
— Dylan LeClair
And for the “ETH Proof of Stake is so much more environmentally friendly” crowd, we are explicitly not on the same team.
The attack vector from a narrative perspective is so extremely obvious.
Imagine attempting to attack our best shot at non-sovereign *apolitcal* money? pic.twitter.com/j0zkvwWVAU
— Dylan LeClair
Source: https://www.cryptopolitan.com/best-twitter-threads-of-the-day-september-8/