For Daniel Batten, Founder of the Exponential Founders Fund, bitcoin could reduce methane emissions into the atmosphere by 23%.
Gas flash
Methane is a gas whose volume is only 0.00018% of the atmosphere. The latter consists of 80% nitrogen and slightly less than 20% oxygen. The rest is mostly water vapor (0.3% clouds) and CO2 (0.04%).
However, these minority gases have a powerful influence on the greenhouse effect. A bit like a few drops of dye are enough to make water opaque.
Since 1850, humans have added small drops of opacifier to the atmosphere, increasing the amount of CO2 by 40%. This carbon dioxide has the effect of trapping the infrared emitted by the earth when it reflects the sun’s energy towards space.
Methane is no exception. It alone is responsible for almost 30% of the greenhouse effect. The reason is that its “pacifying” action is 80 times greater than carbon dioxide. That said, methane only stays in the atmosphere for about ten years.
Conversely, if most of the CO2 released into the air dissolves in the ocean over a period of 20 to 200 years (which acidifies the oceans, etc.), it will be necessary to wait a few thousand years until there is too much CO2 there. remove from the atmosphere…
However, it is clear that unburned methane emissions are 3.5 times worse than expected. This is how Daniel Batten’s studies emerged thanks to NASA satellites used to examine the gases burned in the oil and gas industry.
So what to do since it is out of the question to do without oil? Getting rid of it in the most environmentally friendly way possible is the beginning of the solution. The easiest way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is to mitigate methane leaks from flare stacks.
According to the UN, reducing man-made methane by 45% this decade would prevent global warming by 0.3 degrees Celsius.
Bitcoin to “put out” flames.
Here’s the problem with methane escaping from flares:
“When an oil company is extracting oil, it’s not just extracting oil. There is also methane that comes with it. Unfortunately, it is often not economical to bring this gas to civilization due to the remoteness of the pipelines. So what do we do? It is burned because it cannot be stored. However, flaring does not completely solve the problem of methane emissions. According to the International Energy Agency, some of the methane is always released into the atmosphere due to the wind, which prevents the complete combustion of the methane into CO2. There are still about 8%. »
Fortunately, there is an industry that can spend energy wherever it is: bitcoin mining.
Crusoe Energy, a company specializing in the recovery of flare gas from the oil and gas industry, recently raised $505 million to deploy. mining of BTC on oil sites in the United States.
The French Grand Bloc was also very close to operations that started in Russia before the war in Ukraine.
“As well as being highly cost effective and ticking the ESG box, Crusoe Energy is helping to solve one of our most important environmental issues”welcome Daniel Batten during the Surfin’Bitcoin conference (from 47 minutes HERE).
“Crusoe Energy burns methane in a generator to generate electricity to mine Bitcoin. The amount of methane escaping drops from 8% to 0.1%. Or some 80 of the emissions. »
Methane emissions from the oil and gas industry and landfills account for 41% of all man-made methane emissions. So much so that Mr. Batten believes so “Bitcoin mining could reduce methane emissions by 23%”. “This would reduce global warming by 0.15°C”.
Even the White House agrees:
To go further, do not miss the two previous articles on the subject:
So, in addition to consuming 60% renewable energy, the mining bitcoin helps to tackle the problem of global warming. Even better, this purchased energy acts as a subsidy that the fossil fuel industry will need to achieve the energy transition.
Get a summary of the news in the world of cryptocurrencies by subscribing to our new service daily and weekly so you don’t miss any of the essential Cointribune!
Journalist reporting on the Bitcoin revolution. My papers deal with bitcoin through geopolitical, economic and libertarian prisms.
