Gold mining is similar to coal mining, both require the clearing and destruction of entire forests, farmland, lakes and rivers, water reservoirs,
wildlife habitats in order to mine the gold. Large amounts of mercury and other toxic chemicals are used to extract and purify the gold which of course
is very destructive to the physical environment. Mercury causes cancer and disease to humans, plants and animals.
Gold mining is often a cause of wars and violence from people fighting over the gold mines especially in Africa.
Gold mining often causes problems for an area because there is competition between one party and another and I even see traditional gold mining often causing environmental damage using mercury. The most obvious impact is that the environment is damaged, animals lose their homes and rivers begin to be polluted due to the use of hard water such as mercury.
Conflicts of interest are always used as an excuse because they hide behind the law and generally those who own gold or coal mines are people who have access to power so that even though they are damaging they can still operate as usual.
If the so-called environmentalists such as Greenpeace had half a brain maybe they would be advocating for bitcoin as a superior,
cleaner alternative to gold instead of talking out of their rear end about something they know nothing about.
There is a lot of stupid news that is deliberately created for bitcoin miners and even said that bitcoin miners are much more damaging to the environment. But if you study it, maybe gold and new stone miners are much more dangerous because apart from the environment and the surrounding community, they also experience quite bad impacts from the mining process.