Is Your Bitcoin Mined by Elves Riding Windmills? Shocking Eco Secrets REVEALED!

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North America Dominance, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Hashrate

With a click and a hum, the United States has risen, top-hatted and star-spangled, to claim a resplendent 75.4% share of reported Bitcoin mining. Canada, meanwhile, brings its elks and maple syrup—adding 7.1% (and a moral superiority it shares with no one but itself). When these two gently fist-bump, over 80% of all reported mining bravely occurs under their agreeable skies. The wise men of CCAF suggest, in their dignified mutters, that perhaps things are a bit clustered. Oh, to be a Bitcoin in Saskatchewan!

Their report, full of the usual academic pearl-clutching (and survey-sized grains of salt), notes: “directionally relevant developments,” which is bureaucrat for “Guess what? South America and the Middle East are mining too.” Meanwhile, dear China—once the supreme sovereign of Bitcoin—has been sending its miners off on an involuntary gap year, fleeing with VPNs crammed in suitcases and dreams of Texas barbecue. VPN miners

Even when the Chinese dragon decreed “none shall mine,” miners simply became invisible, hoping authorities only check for illegal Wi-Fi—and not illegal hash rate.

Why did this crackdown rain down? To please President Xi Jinping’s four-decade carbon diet, of course. Hence, mining now does its best impression of a Scandinavian spa: clean, renewable, smug. Activists had their banners; miners had their hydroelectric daydreams.

Three years later: voilà—over half our Bitcoins come wrapped in sustainable certificates and the smug smile of some rivers and breezes!

From the CCAF’s own trembling quill: “The miners’ electricity is, astonishingly, 52.4% sustainable, 42.6% renewable. Hydropower leads (23.4%), wind chases (15.4%), nuclear rummages along (9.8%), and little solar (3.2%) waves from the back. Fossil fuels hang grimly to 47.6% (with natural gas roaring ahead at 38.2%), coal pouting (8.9%), and oil—clutching its pearls—at just 0.5%.”

Bitcoin Mining Power Consumption up 17%—Because, Apparently, Y’all Clicked “Update All”

Sustainable schmustainable, the party rages on—annual electricity consumption has ballooned a whopping 17% year over year! Yes, 138 terawatt-hours, for those keeping score at home, which is 0.54% of global electricity or exactly enough to power a small country or one overly enthusiastic gamer’s PC. Miners report $45 per megawatt-hour in electricity—about as much as your cousin’s rent—while “all-in” costs touch $55.50. Eighty percent of operational expenses? All spent on the cosmic pursuit of digital coins nobody can hold—all while your toaster sits, quietly jealous.

98% of all that humming, whirring power capacity is just for Bitcoin, bless its pixelated heart. But suddenly, the CCAF report gets all ominous—it appears the industry is at a crossroads. (Let’s hope it actually uses a map this time.)

New growth needs to emerge—will Bitcoin miners pivot to AI workloads? Will they find new excuses for their electricity bills? Only time, ambition, and possibly some clever hedging will tell…

Speaking of which, “innovative energy solutions” like using flared gas (yum), scooping up wasted heat, and responding to demand-side signals have entered the chat. And that buzzword “hashprice hedging”? Like hedging your bets at a very strange racetrack, but for computer elves.

Thus, in this theater of whirring fans and glowing screens, North America styles itself as the world’s Bitcoin baron—while hydroelectric rivers and envious winds do their best to keep the digital presses rolling. Try not to trip over the extension cords. 😉

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2025-04-30 07:59