Bitcoin Sustainability Report January 2019

After a continuous drop in Bitcoin’s energy consumption for several months, January sadly put an end to this trend. The highlights of the past month are as follows:

  • Mining revenues dropped just one percent.
  • Mining revenue from transaction fees decreased by 15 percent.
  • The total network power consumption increased by almost 4 percent.
  • The average fee per single transaction was $0.25.
  • The average energy consumption per transaction was down by around 7 percent, and amounts to 438 KWh per unique transaction (enough to power 1 U.S. household for almost 15 days).

The full report is featured below:

Description Value Monthly change Trend
Mining Revenue
Average Bitcoin Price $3,680 -1.05%
Average Price Volatility 52.06% -31.57%
Mining Revenue from Fees $2,273,848 -15.25%
Mining Revenue from Blocks Mined $205,460,247 -0.80%
Total Mining Revenue $207,734,095 -0.99%
Mining Costs
Total Costs of Mining $194,793,467 1.28%
Percentage of Total Revenue 93.77% 2.28%
Total KWh Consumed 3,993,542,073 3.59%
Network Statistics
Total Transactions Processed 9,126,173 11.69%
Average KWh Consumed per TX 438 -7.20%
Average Fee per Transaction $0.25 -24.24%
Energy cost per TX (at 5 cents per KWh) $21.90 -7.20%
Average Network Hashrate (GH/s) 46,106,668,707 11.32%
Average Network Effciency (J/GH) 0.12 -6.95%
Bounds
Economic Maximum KWh Consumed 4,154,681,892 -0.99%
Technical Minimum KWh Consumed 3,958,705,465 11.33%

Year to Date Performance

Apart from the changes in monthly performance, numbers on the current year to date (YTD) performance are found in the following table. These numbers show that Bitcoin has so far consumed as much energy a country like Singapore in 2019. Moreover, when comparing to the previous year, we find that Bitcoin consumed 12% more energy in January 2019 than in January 2018. Mining revenues are, however, substantially lower than at the start of the previous year.

Description 2018 2017 YoY Change
Mining Revenue
Average Bitcoin Price $3,680 $13,053 -71.81%
Average Price Volatility 52.06% 117.63% -55.74%
Mining Revenue from Fees $2,273,848 $210,743,155 -98.92%
Mining Revenue from Blocks Mined $205,460,247 $913,123,598 -77.50%
Total Mining Revenue $207,734,095 $1,123,866,753 -81.52%
Mining Costs
Total Costs of Mining $194,793,467 $177,591,836 9.69%
Percentage of Total Revenue 93.77% 15.80% 493.41%
Total KWh Consumed 3,993,542,073 3,551,836,714 12.44%
Network Statistics
Total Transactions Processed 9,126,173 8,953,239 1.93%
Average KWh Consumed per TX 438 397 10.33%
Average Fee per Transaction $0.25 $23.54 -98.94%
Energy cost per TX (at 5 cents per KWh) $21.90 $19.85 10.33%
Average Network Hashrate (GH/s) 46,106,668,707 19,397,560,876 137.69%
Average Network Effciency (J/GH) 0.12 0.25 -52.70%
Bounds
Economic Maximum KWh Consumed 4,154,681,892 22,477,335,065 -81.52%
Technical Minimum KWh Consumed 3,958,705,465 1,665,287,741 137.72%

Disclaimer

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 unsustainability of the proof-of-work algorithm. The sustainability report uses historical data from the Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index to summarize 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.

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  1. cookie clicker March 28, 2022