Bitcoin arouses passion, curiosity and has received more and more media attention, especially after having climbed the ranks of the best financial asset of the decade. However, whenever its price goes up, many doubts and questions arise, mainly around its origin and the energy expenditure by miners. The Bitcoin protocol has created a unique digital asset To understand how Bitcoin (BTC) is created and what mining is, the key is the double-spending problem. Before Bitcoin, there was neither a digital value to be transferred nor a digital asset to be divided into several parts. That is, if you scanned a …

Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak’s new token, Efforce (WOZX), almost doubled in price today after an astonishing run that saw the price increase around 26 times in the past week. WOZX will open for trading on South Korea-based exchange Bithumb on Dec. 9, and is already up 2,490% since first being listed on the HBTC exchange on Dec. 3. It opened at $0.10 per token and is currently trading at $2.59. Ethereum blockchain token WOZX is a way to securitize energy savings. The token has a total supply of one billion and was sold via private funding rounds conducted earlier this …

A three-year pilot scheme for an innovative blockchain-based electric vehicle charging platform has received $1 million in funding from Natural Resources Canada, a department of the country’s government. The scheme promises to reduce the cost of electric vehicle charging transactions and enhance power grid efficiency, according to an article on the independent Electric Autonomy Canada platform. The pilot will take place at two multi-tenanted office buildings in downtown Toronto, and is run by electric vehicle charging platform SWTCH Energy and intelligent energy software developer Opus One Solutions. The innovation comes through the understanding that electric vehicles aren’t just alternatively-powered cars, …

En+ Group, the world’s top producer of low-carbon aluminum and the largest private-sector generator of hydropower, has entered its first crypto mining joint venture. The new venture, called Bit+, will focus on creating facilities that support crypto mining with a low carbon footprint. En+ Group’s partner in Bit+ is the Russian company BitRiver, which provides hosting services and turnkey solutions for large-scale, institutional crypto mining operations. BitRiver currently operates the largest data center offering colocation services for Bitcoin (BTC) mining in the Russian Federation and offers similar services across the country and to CIS neighbors. The first result of the …

The Port of Rotterdam's blockchain subsidiary, Blocklab, has been trialing a decentralized electricity trading system to help lower costs and optimize the use of renewables on its microgrid. The system, called Distro, has been jointly developed by Blocklab and S&P Global Platts and has been operational as a trial for two months. Distro uses blockchain technology, smart contracts and artificial intelligence to support the decentralized, high-frequency trading of renewable energy by commercial consumers looking to optimize and manage their energy use. It matches demand with the intermittent power generated from different sources, specifically solar and battery storage. Each market participant …

Researchers have developed a new algorithm for distributed ledger protocols, which reporters claim could achieve security without the high power consumption of Bitcoin (BTC) mining. The algorithm, “Scalable Byzantine Reliable Broadcast,” was outlined in a paper first published this August and being presented today, Oct. 16, at the International Symposium on Distributed Computing (DISC 2019) in Budapest, Hungary. The paper’s authors, Rachid Guerraoui, Petr Kuznetsov, Matteo Monti, Matej Pavlovic, Dragos-Adrian Seredinschi — based at the Federal Polytechnic School in Lausanne, Switzerland — have won the DISC 2019 Best Paper Award for their research. A new way of tackling Byzantine fault-tolerant …

A startup has unveiled bold plans to tackle the excessive levels of energy consumption seen in cryptocurrency mining, all while giving everyday computer users more of a chance to receive block rewards. Resistance argues that proof-of-work mining “has been hijacked by huge mining farms using tons of energy to take control of the market” — isolating normal consumers who cannot afford to get involved with Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. The company also says the levels of electricity being used is “wasted on mathematical equations” rather than making a positive impact on humanity. As a result, Resistance is seeking to address …