Why the energy consumption of bitcoin miners is not a valid argument

Hello friends,    

If you've read the financial news the last couple of weeks, you've probably heard arguments among these lines:    

"Bitcoin miners now consume more energy than the entire country of Ireland." 

"The miners are wasting energy to solve rubbish and meaningless math."   

The mass media and other skeptics often use the power consumption of bitcoin miners as an argument against the technology.   

I'm an environmental engineer. Next year I'm finishing my Masters degree in Renewable Energy. Many of my friends and family seems to have noticed my little fascination for bitcoin (wonder why). When they read the newspaper headlines I mentioned above, they challenge me on this. They set these assertions up against my education, and my engagement for a sustainable use of our planets limited resources. Then they assume I’m going to agree with them.     

But I don't.    

I’m not saying that we shouldn’t seek to find renewable and efficient energy sources for the miners, but in my opinion the miners aren’t the major problem here.   

Today we’ve got a financial system based on the illusion of eternal growth. Almost every government in the western world is expecting the annual growth of the national economy to be 2 %. Anyone with basic mathematical understanding can see that this is an exponential equation. To satisfy the goal of 2 % annual growth, you would need an equal increased consumption of goods and services by the consumers – you and me.    

As we know, our planet has limited resources. We already consume approximately 1,5 times what our planet provides us. In other words, 50 % more than what’s sustainable. And our governments want us to increase our consumption? Something is clearly not adding up here…    

In my opinion the major problem is not the bitcoin miners, but the entire financial system. I believe the bitcoin miners represent the good side of this story. I also believe we will see a major financial crisis soon. Most likely it will be bad. But this time we shouldn’t try to fix it. We should allow the bubble to burst.    

We see this in nature everyday: Something old has to die for new and better life to come along.