Quote from: RE on Dec 04, 2023, 11:35 PMI was already well aware of the electricity consumption pit of Bitcoin mining, however this is the first article I have run across that puts numbers to the absolutely ASTOUNDING consumption of WATER used for each Bitcoin transaction. It boggles the mind to comprehend that each time someone clicks the BUY button on a website and uses Bitcoin to pay for it, he is flushing a swimming pool worth of fresh water down the sewer to do it.  It's hard for me to grasp why these servers don't use the vast quantity of waste water coming from bath tubs or agricultural runoff for this.  Or closed loop radiator systems like ICE cars use.

This raises the question also as to how much water is used to run the ChatGPT3 servers each time you have it write 300 lines of code for a subroutine?  Not to mention the myriad of other applications AI is being thrown at.  Yet another reason the takeover of AI is not unstoppable.  Besides a shortage of power to run the computers, a shortage of water to keep them cool also will put a limit to its expansion.



https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/cryptocurrency/each-bitcoin-transaction-consumes-4200-gallons-of-water-enough-to-fill-a-swimming-pool-and-could-potentially-cause-freshwater-shortages

Each Bitcoin transaction uses 4,200 gallons of water — enough to fill a swimming pool — and could potentially cause freshwater shortages

RE

I really do not get the water figure. So if I read the article correctly bit miners use water to cool their servers and then what? Destroy it? Remove it from the water chain somehow? I suppose if they evaporate it it would be lost to immediate use. I'll admit I find Bitcoin ridiculous but I did recently join a chat about using surplus solar capacity wasted in the summer time to run bitminers. The economics of it work even if it is still crazy ...