BBC says every Bitcoin transaction uses “a pool of water.”

In an article published on Wednesday (29), the BBC states that every Bitcoin transaction uses a pool of water. According to the broadcaster, Bitcoin mining used 1.6 trillion liters of water in 2021.

The news is based on a study published by Alex de Vries, an author who stated in 2017 that Bitcoin mining could consume half of the world’s electricity by 2020. His prediction was not even close to reality.

Regardless, their new research indicates that a Bitcoin transaction uses 6 million times more water than a credit card transaction. As an example, Vries mentions that the liquid is used to regulate the temperature of equipment, but also to humidify the air.

However, the largest use is for energy generation. After being criticized for their use of coal, several mining companies looked for ‘green’ solutions to support their operations. Hydroelectric power stations are the largest suppliers.

“Bitcoin’s water footprint has increased rapidly in recent years”points out the study. “Bitcoin’s water footprint increased significantly by 166% in 2021 compared to 2020.”

“The water footprint per transaction processed on the Bitcoin blockchain in these years was 5,231 and 16,279 liters respectively.”

Like Greenpeace, the author suggests that Bitcoin change its code, just as Ethereum did last year, to abandon the model known as Proof-of-Work.

“[Isso] That was only possible because the management of Ethereum is significantly more centralized than that of Bitcoin.”James Davenport, professor at the University of Bath, told the BBC.

Community responds to the survey

One of the first reactions from the community was the fact that Alex de Vries had already made a big mistake when he declared in 2017 that Bitcoin would consume half of the world’s electricity by 2020. According to Daniel Batten, co-founder of CH4 Capital, the author was wrong a whopping 2,509 times.

“The day after the Independent published the results of a high-quality independent study on Bitcoin, the BBC published junk science from a well-known anti-Bitcoin lobbyist, using a previously debunked methodology to claim that Bitcoin uses a lot of water.”

“The water use claim is ridiculous for two simple reasons. First, water consumption per transaction is as inaccurate a measure as ‘energy consumption per transaction’. Bitcoin’s energy (and water) consumption does not come from transactions, but from mining companies that produce Bitcoin.”Batten continued in his long outburst.

“It’s like saying, ‘New Zealand has a GDP of $100 billion and 20 million sheep, so we have a GDP of $50,000 per sheep. Once a false metric is implemented, we can make all kinds of absurd claims, such as: “So if we double our number of sheep, we will double our GDP.”

Why the @BBC news article about Bitcoin and Water is a monument to journalistic lazinesshttps://t.co/BRGRXzAeBW

The day after the Independent published the results of a high-quality independent study on Bitcoin, the BBC published the junk science of a well-known anti-Bitcoin lobbyist using…

— Daniel Batten (@DSBatten) November 29, 2023

Other investors did not take the investigation so seriously and made fun of the BBC headline. You can also find several memes about Bitcoin’s water footprint on Twitter.

“The feeling when your pool doesn’t have enough water to send a transaction.”

Any ideas where you can get cheap water? I’m trying to send some #Bitcoin to my location @BBC drive and keep getting this error @BlixtWallet pic.twitter.com/qWLon09zpp

— HODL never SODL 13% 丰 🇸🇻 Bitcoin ONLY (@HODLneverSODL) November 30, 2023

According to the BBC, Bitcoin uses one swimming pool of water per transaction 🤡. https://t.co/yEtZIObesh pic.twitter.com/nsLJUE6P2H

— MacroMinutes (@MacroMinutes) November 30, 2023

Finally, in addition to criticism of energy consumption, Bitcoin now apparently also has a problem with water consumption. Soon we may see new studies talking about air pollution.