Committed to protecting the environment, but in favor of Bitcoin, Elon Musk has been criticized for ‘over-promising’

According to Bloomberg, the fact that Elon Musk poured money into Bitcoin implies many meanings, from marketing strategy to increasing his wealth. But the move goes against one of Elon Musk’s fundamental goals when he founded the electric car company Tesla, which is to protect the environment.

Everyone understands that mining Bitcoin costs a lot of energy and pollutes the environment. Bitcoin miners consume a lot of electricity to solve mathematical equations, validate transaction codes to get back a lot of virtual money working. Some calculations show that the total electricity consumption of Bitcoin miners in the world is equivalent to the total electricity consumption of Finland.

Unfortunately, there are not many Bitcoin miners in Finland as the country takes it very seriously in terms of environmental protection. So Bitcoin miners look to countries like China to locate their miners. Furthermore, electricity prices in the Asian powerhouse are also quite cheap, half as much as Finland, according to many estimates.

Currently more than two-thirds of Bitcoin miners are in China, although the country prohibits transactions in the virtual currency. Unfortunately, burning coal for thermal power is the main source of energy here, contributing largely to both environmental and air pollution.

Modern and harmful electricity

Similar to Bitcoin polluting the environment, everyone understands that using electric cars reduces greenhouse gas emissions more than gasoline cars. In China, an electric car produces 38% less greenhouse gas emissions on average than a gasoline car. But if you use Bitcoin to buy electric cars, the story is completely different.

With Bitcoin rising in price following the statements of billionaire Elon Musk, people will mine more and more virtual currency and use more electricity and pollution. According to Blockchain.com, the number of Bitcoin miners has increased by 60% in the past year.

Even more surprising is that Bitcoin is not widely used or in the hands of many people to serve a better purpose, but what billionaire Elon Musk is aiming for. About 95% of Bitcoin today is in the hands of less than 3% of accounts opened. This raises the question of Bitcoin’s rise in price as nothing more than a speculation rather than being recognized as an alternative payment option.

Even according to Bloombeg, many investors with gambling blood poured money here just to make a profit, regardless of the real value of the blockchain.

According to Bank of America (BofA) estimates, the price of Bitcoin will increase by about 1% for every $ 93 million poured into the market. Meanwhile, to increase the price of gold by 1%, the amount needed to pour in is up to $ 2 billion.

Returning to the Tesla story, Elon Musk’s dumping of $ 1.5 billion into the market made Bitcoin’s price skyrocket from $ 40,000 to $ 60,000. In addition to increasing the property value for himself, the founder of Tesla himself also makes the environment more polluted, although he always wants to protect the earth.

BofA’s calculations show that for every $ 1 billion, the price of Bitcoin will increase by about 11%, equivalent to stimulating miners and releasing 5.4 million tons of greenhouse gas emissions into the environment. So billionaire Elon Musk’s $ 1.5 billion is equivalent to 8.1 million tons of greenhouse gas emissions. This equates to the emissions saved by 238,000 electric vehicles in the US over its lifetime.

As a reminder, in the past year, the number of 3S Models that Tesla made in the US has not reached this number.

Worse, if a person spent $ 55,000 in Bitcoin to buy Model 3S from Tesla, the amount of greenhouse gas emissions to mine this virtual currency reaches 300 tons, 9 times the amount of greenhouse gas savings that the the vehicle advertises itself throughout its life cycle.

Well, an idea of ​​technology to help humans as well as protect the environment turned out to be not as clean as people think.