Biden Administration To Reduce Crypto Mining Energy Consumption

In a conversation with Bloomberg Law, Costa Samara, principal assistant director for energy for the white house office of science and technology policy, has revealed that the white house is setting up policies to lower cryptocurrency mining energy consumption.

Digital Assets go hand in hand with climate and energy

Following President Joe Biden’s executive order in March pressing federal agencies to ensure the “responsible” mining of digital assets such as cryptocurrency, White House’s Energy team is drafting a report on energy consumption.

Samaras told Bloomberg Law that, It’s important, if mining crypto is going to be part of the USA’s financial system in any meaningful way, that it’s developed responsibly and minimizes total emissions, he went on to note that digital assets should be thought of in a climate and energy conversation.

The White House energy team plans to assess everything from local noise pollution to the energy efficiency of using different mining techniques—comparing Bitcoin’s proof-of-work technique with proof-of-stake, which is used by other cryptocurrencies and is more than 99% more energy efficient.

The team will be keeping an open mind as it collects evidence, “We need to think about what would be the appropriate policy responses under a world that shifted to proof-of-stake, or a world that has some continuous mix of proof-of-work and proof-of-stake,” Samaras said. 

An Executive Order on Ensuring Responsible Development of Digital Assets

Earlier this year, President Biden issued an Executive Order called “Ensuring Responsible Development of Digital Assets”, this order questions whether existing legal frameworks are adequate to accommodate sound Executive Branch and independent agency, potentially inviting further consideration of new legislation

The President’s order is the first time that the White House has sought to develop a coordinated plan for the regulation and development of digital assets, and it thus represents an important first step in direction of a consistent regulatory policy.

The Executive Order outlines some objectives like; protecting US consumers, investors, and businesses,  preserving the stability of the US and global financial systems, preventing illicit finance and national security risks,  reinforcing US leadership in the global financial system and technological competitiveness, e.t.c