Carbon Footprint

Summary

Given the recent boom in cryptocurrency mining demand, there have been growing concerns about cryptocurrency mining's environmental impact, sustainability, and potential impact on grid reliability. While there have been many scholarly studies focusing on the energy consumption and carbon footprint of cryptocurrency mining, the impacts of cryptocurrency mining on the electricity sector remain unknown.

Our work presents a holistic insight that analyzes the impacts of cryptocurrency mining on carbon emission, market prices, and system reliability by leveraging a large-scale grid model and high-resolution spatio-temporal data. We study the location of mining loads as a critical factor in carbon emission. We show that the carbon footprint of cryptocurrency mining loads exhibits locational disparity. Specifically, low-electricity-price locations can control carbon emissions below 50% of the system-wide average, while close-to-renewable locations do not necessarily lead to low carbon emissions.