There was also an older thread, back in 2014 ringing a few alarms.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=694401.msg7841368#msg7841368At the current price ($600 per BTC) it means that the network consumes something like 600MW. That is one third of the electric capacity of the plant of Fessenheim that made the news today (in France).
We're 10 times above that (price is almost x20) but also the rewards halved.
The question is, what if
BTC goes to 100 000$?
The entire
untapped energy in Iceland won't be enough.
With that much money , I hate to say it but "printed" each day, we will have millions of miners added to the network.
Should we do the numbers for 1 million /
BTC?
At 1 million, and even at a 10c/kwh price we are going to see 300 GW , as it's still profitable to mine and you will still get a ROI.
And even Itapu is a joke to that number.
I really think that people dismiss to easy the impact mining has, and it's not just bitcoin.
Tried to buy a GPU lately ?