In fact, I'm not even a huge supporter of Bitcoin. I respect Bitcoin for what it has brought.
It kinda sucks that all other cryptos tank when it tanks. I'd like to see Cryptos be their own market not depended on bitcoin's stability to be stable themselves.
It's like owning stock in a company that's completely unrelated, and unreliant on google but watching your stock dip because google stocks dipped.
That said, I'm not making this post to Shill against the FUD around bitcoins energy usage. I'm gonna lay down a well informed post that shows you how IGNORANCE wastes more energy than Bitcoin ever could.
It's a long read, and even longer if you are fact checking it.
So who am I?
What are my qualifications to talk about energy usage?
I'm a small business owner, I Run a Commercial HVAC/R Company (Heating Ventilation Air Conditioning Refrigeration).
Unfortunately I started this company a month before lockdowns hit and lost pretty much all my contracts. (Non essential) Worst part about it Is I actually started it to specialize in Indoor Air Quality, and Curing Building Sickness(Viruses, chemicals In the air).
You'd think I'd be booming but since Asia bought out all our available products, most companies were stuck on a 6 month waiting list to get a products for one job nevermind enough to last through the pandemic. You couldn't even find them online at the time even if you were willing to rip yourself off and pay 10x the price.
Anyway. Being a high quality HVAC tech requires you to have a great understanding of electricity as 90% of repairs require you to troubleshoot...
-
Electrical circuits both AC and DC running off 5V/12V/24v/120V/208V/230v/240V/460v and 570Volts.
-
Electro-mechanical components such as compressors, Variable frequency Drives, ECMs(Electronic Communicated Motors), LED driven Motors, floating shaft drives that are suspended in air by EMF(Electric magnetic force) fields to prevent friction and lower energy usage.
-
Completely up to date with Local, state, and federal electric codes
-
System Harmonics
Newer more energy efficient systems are getting more and more complicated, and some are known to send harmonics through the buildings electrical systems. Which can set a building on fire.
It's not surprising that an well experienced, well educated HVAC tech knows more about electricity than your everyday electrician.
I also have to have a decent understanding of plumbing on top of all this, Manual J(Heat load calculations) for permits, Manual D(Air flow dynamics).
You have to be very efficient in all this stuff..At least if you're looking to get paid Top dollar by a company. But even lower end average joe hack and slash cold beer can techs that replace your home AC unit have some understanding of this stuff. I'd stupid how much you have to know. One fuck Up and you can not only get sued out of business, you can actually get yourself killed.
Ok enough of this. These are my qualifications. I know a lot about energy usage.
Now let's talk about How Ignorance, and Selfishness for that matter wastes way more energy than Bitcoin ever could.
Let's start off with selfishness
Rich people who own huge unnecessary homes. I've done HVAC service for plenty of these homes. I've seen enough.
More than 10% of homes in America are values at $1,000,000 or more.
There are 850,000 Primary residential homes valued at over $1,000,000+
now of course not all of these are bigger than an average home. A regular sized house in NYC running just one HVAC system can cost MILLIONS. I'm not talking about those. I'm talking about outside of the big cities.
Let's take homes in and around Alpine, NJ where Chris Rock Lives. Bergen County, NJ I believe the second richest county in the US. Ho-ho-kus NJ is close. I've seen and worked on many of these homes.
The amount of HVAC equipment that's needed to heat and cool these completely unnecessary oversized homes is equivalent to running 10 Antminer S9s a day.
1 Antminer S9 running 24hours a day is using a total of 36KWH
1 5 Ton central AC unit running 12Hrs a day is using 60KWH
Rule of thumb is 1KWH per ton. 5 TON = 5KWH x 12 = 60KWH. The average home in these areas are running FIVE 5 ton ACS and a couple 3 Tonners. You know..to keep the guest house in the back cool at all times in case you get an unexpected guest. No most of the time they aren't "Energy efficient 16 Seer(Seasonal energy efficiency Rating)".
I'm not even considering poorly maintained systems that are older still running off O-Zone depleting R 22 Refrigerant. A lot of these homes still have older systems like that aren't properly maintained to run as efficient as possible. Let's not forget all the add ons these people get to their systems. Those numbers are just Bare bone systems. Most have Humidifiers (for winter) attached, zoning controls, alarms , condensation pumps.
It's stupid.
Sure, most people who are rich want a big mansion. But at the end of the day, rich or not if you cared about the environment so much, you wouldn't need an stupid oversized home like that and most of these people are never home but they have their systems running all the time. They have house sitters to watch their homes when they're on vacation. Yes. House sitters. Usually a friend to just come by and live in your home. God knows why you need that shit but you're rich. Why not hire someone to put your shoes on in the morning?
Guess who has huge stake in the news networks that tell you BTC is wasteful??? It's not people on this sub hoping to go lambo one day that's for sure.
Now enough complaining about rich people.
Let's talk about the Ignorance part of regular folks that waste more energy than a Bitcoin miner.
Ignorance
Most average homes not occupied by rich people run one 3-5Ton HVAC unit at least 10hrs a day and again many homes are still running O-zone depleting R22 (CFC) systems that are easily using at least 50% more power than new systems.
Let's not even consider the amount of copper needed for these units. Which is around 30lbs of copper. That's more copper in one system than is needed to make 100,000 pennies made after 1982. I'm also proficient in melting metals. We have to understand melting points of metals for various reasons not getting into it though. There's 100,000,000 air conditioned homes in America and like mentioned above , not all are running just one system. That's enough copper to make 10,000,000,000,000 pennies and like I said. That's considering 1 per home and not considering how many system replacements each year. That's also not considering the AC in your cars which run a 3 Ton system on average.
Yes, your average car needs enough tonnage to cool a home because it has to have the ability to bring the temp down from 100 degrees to 75 degress in a minute where is a home needs a gradual decrease in temp over the course of a few hours.
So where's the ignorance part?
Most of these people are pumping their ACs when they don't need it. I know this from experience and also understanding of psychrometric charts. Yes, I also have to have an understanding of meteorology basics.
Again. It's stupid how much things you need to know to be efficient in this field we don't get enough credit for it. The human comfort zone is 70-75 degrees 45-55% RH(relative humidity)
Most people are setting their thermostats to 68° to 72° on a 70-75 degree day when really they only need to have their window open because....
meh...it's just a little too stuffy in here honey...btw did you read that article on how Bitcoin wastes energy? What greedy selfish people they are
Not only that. Most of these older systems are leaking that CFC refrigerant.
Did you know 1 chlorine atom can destroy up to 100,000 Ozone molecules???
That is stupid pollution.
Honey, call the HVAC guy...we need to top off our system with refrigerant again...it's 77 degrees in here I can't sleep like this
maintenance
Most systems are not properly maintained even if you get a maintenance on your system every season.
The reason why a properly maintained system needs updated electrical components to run as energy efficient as possible. Most have "pitted contactors" that arch. Pitted contactors can be compared to pitted spark plugs in a car. Yeah, these pitted contactors are driving up everyones electrical bill $50-$100 a month. But most people aren't going to pay the extra $100 on top of a $150-$200 maintenance to get this done.
The convo goes like this
Hvac guy: Sir, your contactor should be replaced as well. It's causing your system to use more energy then it needs and it's hurting the longevity of your system
Home owner : how much
Tech : I will put it in for $100
Know it all Ned: can it run through this season without replacing it?
Tech: yes it could but..
Owner: ok fuck it ..I will take care of it next year.
Point here.
You don't need to run your air conditioner when it's 75° in your home. The key to comfort is low humidity. You can spend an extra few hundred bucks and get a dehumidifier attachment to your system that lowers the humidity in your home and uses only 10% the electricity that the system needs the run. Being outside in 100° and high humidity and walking into a home that's 77° with low humidity is a huge difference in feels very comfortable. You don't need to pump your AC down to 68° all freaking day.
Another common misconception is that people think they're saving energy by completely shutting off their systems when they go on a day vacation and then coming home to a house that's 85° and then running the system. That actually uses more energy than running the system to maintain a temperature. Because now this system has to pump hard for the next few hours to get that temperature down to where it needs to be so you can sleep properly without rolling around and sweat.
But...its common sense to turn it off when I leave
No it isn't. If Common Sense was all that was needed to save energy we wouldn't need scientists we wouldn't need high qualify technicians to work on things.
So there you have it. Selfishness, and Ignorance wastes WAY more energy that bitcoin can ever. In fact if you used half the world's energy to mine Bitcoin at the current hash rate all the bitcoins would be mined and exactly 68 days. So no it's not a problem half the world's energy is not going to be used to mine Bitcoin.
![[link]](https://i.redd.it/sec2464q7ex61.jpg){kind=link}
![[link]](https://i.redd.it/ws9ibap88ex61.jpg){kind=link}
![[link]](https://i.redd.it/djvj4tjxsdx61.jpg){kind=link}