NFT or non-replaceable tokens are the latest trend in the art world. Although trends come and go, some special features of NFT have caused a lot of controversy. If you don't know what NFT is, you can just explain it: it is some data that can be used as a certificate of ownership of digital files. Although this may seem harmless at first glance, countless people on the internet praise the creators who sell NFT online. Why? Because it is harmful to the environment. Or that, they said.
Now, let's present the facts about NFT's carbon footprint. Turns out they leave some kind of carbon footprint. This is undeniable. In fact, the amount of energy used by NFT is equivalent to that used by normal homes. However, it depends on the blockchain transaction process used and the behavior of the blockchain miners. Just proving you have photos online is a huge amount of energy. But this is precisely where the verification of this criticism ends.
First, although it consumes a lot of energy, it does not consider how much renewable energy is used to power the NFT. The criticism rests entirely on the assumption that NFT fuel is derived primarily by releasing carbon-emitting energy rather than green energy. The most critical part is that all these complaints are based on assumptions. As for the carbon footprint left by NFT, there is currently no reliable scientific research. All research on this topic is DIY research. But this is not where the "NFT is bad for environmental theory" problem ends. The
problem is greatly exaggerated. The truth is that NFTs are no different for online things that involve harmful effects on the environment. All operations you do online require a constant power source. When you launch your website and find a host, that host will run your website on another 24/7 computer. Consume energy continuously. However, despite the creation of 547,200 websites per day (according to siteefy data), the level of anger is not that high compared to NFT. Here's another problem: If people who have problems with NFTs really care about the environment, then you'd think their last place to voice these concerns would be on Twitter. Yet despite an estimated 0.02 grams of CO2 released into the atmosphere per tweet (according to Twitter developer Raffi Krikorian), Twitter seems to be the place where all these "environmentalists" voice their concerns. Although considering that a single NFT can produce around 90kg of carbon dioxide, this may not be a fair comparison, but I think there have been enough complaints on Twitter to justify this position.
So what should people do instead of harassing artists online via NFT? Perhaps as the Internet becomes more and more complex and therefore requires increased awareness of energy consumption, we should use our collective power to provide funding for organizations that research green energy. There are many ways to help the environment and fundamentally solve this problem. This requires more effort than sending hatred to creators on a comfortable sofa. There will be links to programs dedicated to making green energy more usable, so maybe people who read this book will be more willing to donate. The entire Internet including NFT will one day keep its carbon footprint to a minimum. But the change will not come from harassing artists. This happens only when people decide to direct their anger to the source of the problem.