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The carbon footprint of bitcoin

Analysis
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Published: 13 January 2022

By: Juan Pablo Trespalacios Justin Dijk

The total carbon footprint of the bitcoin network has increased by 25% in 2020, while the number of transactions decreased by 6%. The resulting climate impact in 2020 is estimated to be 402 kg of CO2 per bitcoin transaction. This outcome is based on a new method developed by DNB to measure bitcoin's carbon footprint. The new method has five building blocks, each based on open access data sources. DNB encourages any interested party to adopt the method, suggest improvements and update results when more recent and/or better data becomes available.

The carbon footprint of bitcoin

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