I like your article because it is a good analysis, and I am sure you wrote it with the best of faith, thanks for posting.

But there is something missing from your article that changes everything, from very bad, to very good.

Another respondent almost pins down your error by identifying that the energy being consumed is mostly renewable, and has to be, as that is the only kind cheap enough to give maximum competitive advantage to the winning miners.

But there is even more to it than that, when we jump down the rabbit-hole of the connection between energy and wealth, realising energy is the currency of nature, following it back to source.

When we do that, we see there is only one kind of energy, and it all comes from the sun.

Further we see there are now two distinct paths of energy to us, one via planet, and one direct from the sun.

Of course the only direct path is solar power.

Any other path takes some form of stored energy, so in a way, energy by that means is second-hand, whereas energy direct from the sun is firsthand.

With that realised, we have to accept Bitcoin is pushing up our demand for firsthand energy, direct from the sun, since that is the only kind that is absolutely free, after cost of solar infrastructure.

Now we might realise Bitcoin is money-as-sunlight.

And it is being continuously exchanged for ever larger sums of money-as-debt.

Now we should realise the economy really is no longer a closed box, neither in terms of money, or energy.

The economists sums no longer add up, and this explains why.

To see where it leads, we have to try to imagine a world without scarcity, where business becomes something done voluntarily, towards a common good, rather than something necessary for profit, because profit is no longer even possible, without scarcity.

If you would like a deeper analysis, you might check out my story about a “Kardashev hinge”.

It will be interesting to see what happens, after the last Bitcoin is minted, I would say.

Exciting times!