Digiconomist is committed to promoting (the development of) sustainable blockchain technology. Blockchain protocols such as Bitcoin currently run on the energy-slurping proof-of-work algorithm (creating these proofs of work is better known as “mining”). The Bitcoin Energy Consumption index is a key tool that was created to provide insight into this energy consumption amount, and raise awareness on the environmental damage caused of the proof-of-work algorithm. This page uses historical data from the Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index to summarise the sustainability progress and performance of the Bitcoin protocol over the past month.
For a daily estimate of Bitcoin’s energy consumption make sure to visit the Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index.
Monthly Changes
The highlights of the past month are as follows:
Description | Value | Monthly change | Trend |
---|---|---|---|
Mining Revenue | For February 2024 | ||
Average Bitcoin Price | $49,641 | 15.65% | |
Average Price Volatility | 32.65% | -9.36% | |
Mining Revenue from Fees | $64,815,879 | -53.85% | |
Mining Revenue from Blocks Mined | $1,332,354,534 | 7.31% | |
Total Mining Revenue | $1,397,170,413 | 1.09% | |
Mining Costs | |||
Total Costs of Mining | $555,980,750 | -4.91% | |
Percentage of Total Revenue | 39.79% | -5.94% | |
Total KWh Consumed | 11,119,614,998 | -6.27% | |
Network Statistics | |||
Total Transactions Processed | 9,942,740 | -33.63% | |
Average KWh Consumed per TX | 1,118 | 41.16% | |
Average Fee per Transaction | $6.52 | -30.49% | |
Energy cost per TX (at 5 cents per KWh) | $55.90 | 41.16% | |
Average Network Hashrate (GH/s) | 574,359,867,573 | 9.61% | |
Average Network Effciency (J/GH) | 0.03 | -8.55% | |
Bounds | |||
Economic Maximum KWh Consumed | 27,943,408,258 | 1.09% | |
Technical Minimum KWh Consumed | 7,809,729,598 | 2.49% |
Year-to-Date Sustainability Performance
Apart from the changes in monthly performance, numbers on the current year to date (YTD) performance are found in the following table.
Description | YTD Current | YTD Previous | YoY Change |
---|---|---|---|
Mining Revenue | For 2024 | For 2023 | numbers up to February |
Average Bitcoin Price | $46,169 | $21,646 | 113.29% |
Average Price Volatility | 34.39% | 35.10% | -2.02% |
Mining Revenue from Fees | $205,275,652 | $20,727,677 | 890.35% |
Mining Revenue from Blocks Mined | $2,573,949,107 | $1,140,741,824 | 125.64% |
Total Mining Revenue | $2,779,224,758 | $1,161,469,500 | 139.29% |
Mining Costs | |||
Total Costs of Mining | $1,140,663,129 | $577,355,927 | 97.57% |
Percentage of Total Revenue | 41.04% | 49.71% | -17.43% |
Total KWh Consumed | 22,983,439,825 | 12,879,079,147 | 78.46% |
Network Statistics | |||
Total Transactions Processed | 24,923,695 | 16,771,470 | 48.61% |
Average KWh Consumed per TX | 922 | 768 | 20.05% |
Average Fee per Transaction | $8.24 | $1.24 | 564.52% |
Energy cost per TX (at 5 cents per KWh) | $46.10 | $38.40 | 20.05% |
Average Network Hashrate (GH/s) | 548,344,982,715 | 282,764,807,076 | 93.92% |
Average Network Effciency (J/GH) | 0.03 | 0.03 | -7.91% |
Bounds | |||
Economic Maximum KWh Consumed | 55,584,495,165 | 23,229,390,009 | 139.29% |
Technical Minimum KWh Consumed | 95,150,958,993 | 81,049,377,393 | 17.40% |
Annual Performance
Year-end performance is available in the table below as of 2017 (the year in which the Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index was launched).
Description | 2023 | 2022 | 2021 | 2020 | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Mining Revenue | |||||||
Average Bitcoin Price | $28,848 | $29,182 | $47,431 | $11,054 | $8,472 | $7,559 | $4,375 |
Average Price Volatility | 32.67% | 48.86% | 63.31% | 47.35% | 59.07% | 64.38% | 66.78% |
Mining Revenue from Fees | $768,722,506 | $142,246,658 | $957,308,712 | $151,123,924 | $146,041,838 | $291,320,194 | $541,679,741 |
Mining Revenue from Blocks Mined | $9,674,805,663 | $9,752,890,417 | $15,688,420,845 | $4,647,830,236 | $4,539,781,369 | $5,854,222,152 | $2,911,553,352 |
Total Mining Revenue | $10,443,528,170 | $9,895,137,075 | $16,645,729,556 | $4,798,954,159 | $4,685,823,207 | $6,145,542,346 | $3,453,233,093 |
Mining Costs | |||||||
Total Costs of Mining | $5,164,057,627 | $8,057,844,192 | $6,700,770,948 | $3,543,503,205 | $2,628,628,083 | $3,117,068,023 | $776,532,329 |
Percentage of Total Revenue | 49.45% | 81.43% | 40.26% | 73.84% | 56.10% | 50.72% | 22.49% |
Total KWh Consumed | 108,591,297,292 | 161,243,016,125 | 134,015,418,967 | 70,870,064,105 | 52,572,561,653 | 62,349,831,163 | 15,530,646,590 |
Network Statistics | |||||||
Total Transactions Processed | 151,476,461 | 92,770,752 | 96,670,416 | 113,017,715 | 93,410,284 | 81,147,382 | 92,167,146 |
Average KWh Consumed per TX | 717 | 1,738 | 1,386 | 627 | 563 | 768 | 169 |
Average Fee per Transaction | $5.07 | $1.53 | $9.90 | $1.34 | $1.56 | $3.59 | $5.88 |
Energy cost per TX (at 5 cents per KWh) | $35.85 | $86.90 | $69.30 | $31.35 | $28.15 | $38.40 | $8.45 |
Average Network Hashrate (GH/s) | 380,585,145,964 | 218,858,998,475 | 146,947,345,705 | 118,556,161,320 | 73,060,732,053 | 39,983,103,533 | 7,288,177,479 |
Average Network Effciency (J/GH) | 0.03 | 0.08 | 0.10 | 0.07 | 0.08 | 0.18 | 0.24 |
Bounds | |||||||
Economic Maximum KWh Consumed | 208,870,563,395 | 197,902,741,492 | 332,914,591,130 | 95,979,083,186 | 93,716,464,141 | 122,910,846,910 | 69,064,661,866 |
Technical Minimum KWh Consumed | 107,288,660,856 | 65,055,230,269 | 45,695,619,584 | 49,134,536,668 | 43,970,936,234 | 40,416,917,349 | 7,365,382,998 |