Witnesses address energy impacts of crypto mining during House

Five industry experts appearing before the United States House Energy and Commerce Oversight Subcommittee had different views on how lawmakers should address the energy consumption of cryptocurrencies.

In written testimony released before a Thursday hearing on “Cleaning Up Cryptocurrency: The Energy Impacts of Blockchains,” former Comptroller of the Currency Brian Brooks argued that the energy consumption of (BTC) mining was “economically productive,” given other assets including gold required roughly the same amount of energy for mining, with the “a host of other environmental concerns.” In addition, Brooks said that the traditional global banking system consumed roughly 2.5 times the amount of power to produce the same amount of value BTC does at its current market capitalization.