- Ethereum now consumes roughly 99.99 percent less energy.
- ETH’s overall electricity consumption per year is only 2,600 megawatts hours.
- Compared to Ethereum 1.0, Ethereum 2.0 is projected to use much less energy.
According to a press release issued on Thursday, September 15, even more, than expected, Ethereum’s energy usage and carbon footprint have decreased after the Merger upgrade. Following the merge, Ethereum now consumes roughly 99.99 percent less energy. Furthermore, the blockchain’s carbon footprint has dropped by over 99.99 percent.
The Ethereum Foundation estimated that, in the past, their merger would cut down the network’s energy consumption by almost 99.95%.
The CCRI report showed that Ethereum’s overall electricity consumption per year is only 2,600-megawatt hours, in comparison to the 23 million megawatt hours before the merge. Because of this decrease, Ethereum’s estimated annual CO2 emissions have also lowered significantly from over 11 million tons to just under 870.
As a frame of reference, that would be less than the combined total emissions coming from 100 average American homes – according to data gathered by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
Currently, there are 140,592 validators from 16,405 unique addresses. However, this number is skewed by including exchanges and staking services. Suppose we remove them, that leaves 87,897 validators who are assumed to be staking from home. This implies that the average home-staker runs 5.4 validator, which seems like a reasonable estimate.
Overall, Ethereum 2.0 is expected to be much more energy-efficient than Ethereum 1.0, but it remains to be seen if it will reach the level of efficiency originally promised. However, even if it only reaches half of its potential, it would still be a vast improvement.
