Cryptocurrency & NFTs

Exploring the impacts of Cryptocurrency and NFTs.

Privacy.

The use of Cryptocurrency is generally anonymous, a huge step for privacy in the digital world.

Environment.

Cryptocurrency mining is very energy intensive (it could be as much energy as the entire of Ireland uses) and has taken on industrial proportions in countries where there is cheap electricity and political favor.
NFTs and coins have huge environmental impacts to our planet and release tonnes of CO2 every year.

Bitcoin released 114.06 Megatonnes CO2 last year and releases 1170.91 kg CO2 per transaction. That's equivalent to 2,595,147 VISA transactions or 195,152 hours of watching Youtube.
Source: Bitcoin Energy Consumption, Digiconomist, 2022 .
A single NFT transaction on the Ethereum platform emits almost 150 kilograms of carbon dioxide, equivalent to 331,056 Visa transactions or 24,895 hours of watching YouTube. However, this may change soon.
Source: NFTs and the Environment, Investopedia, 2022 .

Solana, Algorand, Cardano, and Tezos offer energy-efficient NFTs which heavily reduce the environmental impact of transactions.

The Ethereum blockchain is about to become less of an energy hog thanks to a new "proof-of-stake" operating model. The official switch to this new model is planned to take effect in the second quarter of 2022, according to ethereum.org
Once the merge is complete, the expected energy consumption for a proof-of-stake Ethereum transaction should be the equivalent of 20 minutes of television.