Bitcoin may be in crisis (from which it starts to emerge), but it pollutes and consumes more electricity than ever before. And the figures have reached a point where they are already beginning to worry.

According to a comprehensive investigation by The New York Times, which comes to us via The Verge, Bitcoin mining, in the United States alone, consumes electricity equivalent to a city of 8 million people, and it pollutes the equivalent of 3.5 million cars.

There is also another "side effect" that had not been taken into account so far. In areas where there are cryptocurrency farms, the price of light rises.

The Big Energy Cost of Bitcoin

Bitcoin may have been in crisis for a year, but cryptocurrency mining has not stopped working. In the last month the Bitcoin price has risen by 40%, so it seems that the time of skinny cows is over.

The New York newspaper has investigated the electricity consumption and origin of 34 cryptocurrency farms in the United States that exceed 40 MW of energy consumption. Each carries out a consumption equivalent to 30,000 households.

The Rockdale cryptocurrency farm in Texas, the largest in the country, has a consumption equivalent to 300,000 homes. In total, they consume "like New York City," which has 8 million inhabitants.

Some of these farms use renewable energy, but most of them still feed on fossil fuels. It's no accident that many of them are installed in Texas and North Dakota. There's a lot of cheap oil and coal there, which is used to produce electricity.

Coal and gas plants cover about 85% of the demand that Bitcoin mining adds to electricity grids.

The pollution caused by this consumption of Bitcoin is equivalent to 3.5 million petrol cars.

And these numbers are just from America. Cryptocurrencies are mined in many other countries.

Another interesting fact that has not been taken into account so far is that the price of light rises in areas where cryptocurrency farms exist, because there is more demand, the auction prices for electricity are higher.

In Texas, where 30 percent of crypto farms are, light has risen by at least 5 percent in their areas. That's 1.8 billion dollars a year that citizens pay for cryptocurrencies, which don't benefit them.

Ironically, according to The Verge, while a citizen pays an average of 13 cents of dollar for KWh, cryptocurrency farms only pay 3 cents. The reason is that the state of Texas pays companies not to use electricity when there is high demand, for example in hot or cold waves. Closing in those waves, 5 crypto farms received $60 million from the state in 2020.

That's the reality of Bitcoin: high consumption, high pollution, and rising electricity prices, so they speculate and profit a few.