Cryptocurrencies are here to stay with us, and it is undeniable that they are (in some form) the future.

However, a subset of the current ones are causing major problems in multiple areas, and affecting our lives. We are talking about the so-called Proof-Of-Work cryptocurrencies: the first generation, with Bitcoin as the most famous representative. These coins effectively have to burn huge amounts of electricity for pointless work that is thrown away.

We ask that the use and possession of Proof-Of-Work cryptocurrencies be banned, with a one year max wait period to let the various projects transition to other technologies, like Proof-Of-Stake (so that nobody loses money, and this is already happening in Ethereum)

Follow us on twitter @StopBurncoins or on mastodon @StopBurncoins

The main problems with burncoins are:

• Major power consumption: What is the point of trying to lower the carbon footprint of humanity if bitcoin alone consumes more power than several nations just to exist?
  • High power consumption drives up the price of electricity
  • High power consumption increases the load on the power grid, which will be stressed already with the incoming switch towards electric vehicles. Cities are already suffering power outages today
  • ...Power for what? Burn coins have to guess the solution to a fast mathematical puzzle that gets more complex the more computers try to solve it. Only one solution every 5-10 minutes is accepted. All those crypto guesses will generate absolutely nothing, except for the winner
• Economical Problems: "Mining" is needed to keep the burncoins alive. Mining generates new coins, so there is an economical incentive towards being the one with the biggest mining capability
  • More hardware is needed to mine. We are at least one year inside a shortage in computer parts, with at least an other year more in sight
  • Computer components, (especially GPUs, used in mining) are increasing in price days after their release due to scalpers taking advantage of the shortage
  • Production is shifting to what miners buy, worsening the already bad chip availability that is already slowing down even the auto industry
• Environmental questions: We are regulating cars and emissions on the whole industry, but now we have new big virtual nations of pollutants.
  • Power consumed still comes mostly from fossil fuels especially since most mining happens in China
    
  • Pointlessly dumping huge quantities of power in the air is not  going to help global warming: a quick check tells us that China is creating around 42M tonnes of CO2 every year only from coal just for bitcoin.
  • Each $1 of Bitcoin value created was responsible for $0.49 in health and climate damages in the US and $0.37 in China

We already have lots and lots of cryptocoin projects using newer technology like proof-of-stake, and Ethereum and others have proved that existing projects can switch technology.

Proof-Of-Work burncoins should be banned.
Follow us on twitter @StopBurncoins or on mastodon @StopBurncoins