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Comment by KVFinn | Hacker News Reader

>A cryptocurrency enthusiast would tell you that the energy consumed is not "wasted" because it is necessary to secure the block chain.

Note that this is zero-sum.

If a device is invented tomorrow that is 100x more efficient per dollar/watt to mine, the cost to 'secure the blockchain' remains the same because people will just buy 100x more computing power for the same investment and the difficulty ramps up to compensate.

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This is not correct unless you factor in the hardware cost.

If you changed graphics cards to use 0.1% of their current power, then miners would not immediately buy 1000 times more graphics cards.

you're right about the detail of his point (people won't buy 100x just because a 100x increase in efficiency), but the point he was trying to make is correct. given a fixed global investment, a 100x increase in efficiency won't reduce costs. it will just increase the difficulty level to compensate.

But it does have an impact on the energy use. If the energy efficiency goes up 100x and people aren't using 100x as many machines then the overall energy usage drops.

>But it does have an impact on the energy use. If the energy efficiency goes up 100x and people aren't using 100x as many machines then the overall energy usage drops.

If there really was an overnight 100x improvement there would be a lot of lag, but in the long run the cost is mostly the energy. So if efficiency slowly goes up 100x people will generally use 100x the computing power, and use the same overall energy.

There's some difference because of the ratio of silicon investment to wattage cost over time, but that's the overall shape of it.

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