Ed’s note – Some ethical energy questions

Over the last year or so the headlines around blockchain and Bitcoin have shifted from projects to the latter’s high energy consumption and the efforts of miners to go ‘green’ with renewable energy sourcing and other activities such as ‘mining as a service’ and participating in demand management and flexibility provision.

But miners continue to face growing opposition. In New York a bill is going through legislative proceedings to ban Bitcoin mining and there have been calls for a ban in other locations such as the European Union, although these latter have – for now at least – been rejected.

One of the arguments advanced in for example Sweden was that renewable energy use by Bitcoin miners might leave the country insufficient for other uses such as decarbonising industry. On the face of it this is a reasonable argument, but the question arises as to how renewable energy should be apportioned in such situations and who makes that decision?

Bitcoin mining spared from ban in Europe

For their part of course the miners argue the considerable economic benefits they bring and they can add their own renewable generation, which can bolster the meeting of national targets but does nothing towards the utility’s requirements for its customers.

Another question I would categorise of an ethical nature arises is in the light of the growing number of solar PV installations in what were agricultural lands, as observed recently driving around Kent in southern England. The world’s population is in need of food, albeit very unevenly and particularly in the emerging economies rather than the ‘Garden of England’, and should energy or foodstuffs be the priority?

And even when agricultural products such as sunflowers or sugarcane are grown, should they be used as food products or for biofuels, as in Brazil?

Farmers usually at the bottom of the value chain are likely to opt for the most profitable option and who can blame them. But ultimately these are questions – and there will be others in the future – that arise in the vision of a sustainable world in which there is increasing competition for natural resources, and they need to be more widely discussed and debated than they appear to be so far.

Do you agree?

Jonathan Spencer Jones
Specialist writer