Tesla has dropped a deal to accept bitcoin payments in exchange for Tesla vehicles over alleged crypto’s contribution to climate change. This comes shortly after Tesla CEO Elon Musk publicly announced that the company will be accepting Bitcoin payments in exchange for vehicles early this year.
Prior to the drop down, Tesla had purchased $1.5 billion worth of bitcoins in February. We are concerned about rapidly increasing use of fossil fuels for Bitcoin mining and transactions, especially coal, which has the worst emissions of any fuel.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk wrote on Twitter, Tesla has suspended vehicle purchases using Bitcoin. We are concerned about the rapidly increasing use of fossil fuels for Bitcoin mining and transactions. He adds, Cryptocurrency is a good idea on many levels and we believe it has a promising future but this cannot come at a great cost to the environment.
The statement further says Tesla would resume accepting bitcoin once the process of mining bitcoin transitions to more sustainable energy.
Bitcoin carbon footprint alone sums up to 532.35 kg Co2 which is equivalent to the carbon footprint of 1,179,878 visa transactions or 88,725 hours of watching YouTube which raises concern on the unsustainability of proof of work algorithm.
Ever since its inception Bitcoin’s trust-minimizing consensus has been enabled by its proof-of-work algorithm. The machines on average consume huge amounts of energy while mining. To add on, Statistics by the Digiconomist blog says, an entire bitcoin network can consume more energy than a number of countries if the currency hits new highs. Thus, its energry consumptions hugely clashes with Tesla’s mission to accelerate the worlds transition to a sustainable energy.