Mosh from Protocol Labs here. Specifically on energy use, the Filecoin Green initiative is working to rigorously map and authenticate energy consumption on the network, and become the first carbon-neutral (and eventually carbon-negative) blockchain.
Filecoin uses about the same energy as a comparably sized data center. Specifically, Filecoin provides about 0.77% of all data center storage capacity across the world and consumes about 0.62% of total data center electricity use.
We're also ramping up our ability to help build new solar generation, including a $38M fund to build new solar projects in the US, to produce at least as much renewable energy for the grid as the network consumes.
> to produce at least as much renewable energy for the grid as the network consumes
So redirecting funds from investors/people and resources (production capacity) that could have gone to make everything renewable, to make your blockchain use renewable energy? Why not just not use a PoW blockchain but instead use DHT, IPFS, and other technologies for decentralization?
Then how is it a blockchain, or where does that power draw come from? Sounds more like git than like bitcoin if it doesn't have PoW, but git doesn't use a lot of energy. I'm confused.
(I'm using git here as a bit of a hyperbole to indicate something we all know as being a cryptographically linked list of things while clearly not requiring miners, currencies, or power-hungry infrastructure. Feel free to replace git with a better example if there is one, I'm not sure how to better differentiate between blockchain with and without consensus mechanism than this.)
Filecoin uses what they call Proof-of-Spacetime (PoSt) where basically miners prove that they are storing your data. Unfortunately the SNARK algorithms involved in PoSt are quite computationally expensive so Filecoin uses more energy than PoS but far less than PoW. https://spec.filecoin.io/algorithms/pos/post/
The biggest alarm bell going off for me when reading these articles is "Notably, the system could also be used by bitcoin to help clean up the largest cryptocurrency’s dirty image, according to Filecoin Green’s creator, Alan Ransil."
This is why I lump all cryptocurrency together, even when some projects consider environmental concerns: you're willing to cover for, greenwash and promote the worst actors. There is no scenario where intentionally wasting energy helps us solve the climate crisis.
That is in part because of one flaw in your reasoning: believing that simply switching to renewable energy will solve the problem. Concepts like Jevon's paradox and induced demand really need to be general knowledge at this point... when technology becomes more energy-efficient, people just use more of it, and total energy use doesn't decrease. https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2018/01/bedazzled-by-energ... So long as total energy use keeps rising, adding renewable energy sources won't replace fossil fuels, fossil fuels will continue being used at the same (or growing) rate: https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2009/11/renewable-energy-i... And even if you succeeded in moving entirely to renewable energy, that would not be a license to use as much energy as you please, because installing renewable energy still causes emissions and there are hard limits to e.g. how many solar panels we can install each year and still remain within our carbon budget: https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2015/04/how-sustainable-is...
Relatedly, when you say "Filecoin uses about the same energy as a comparably sized data center", you're assuming that ordinary data centers are compatible with our continued existence as a civilization. The current internet may not be sustainable, we may already have too many energy-intensive data centers: https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2015/10/can-the-internet-r... The time has come for frugal computing, and Filecoin incentivizing people to put more data storage online seems incompatible with that: https://wimvanderbauwhede.github.io/articles/frugal-computin...
Finally, insofar as you're pursuing "carbon-neutral" or "carbon-negative", I'm skeptical of carbon offsets in general. It's the same financialization of everything which is a core problem underlying all cryptocurrency. Gresham's law should also be common knowledge at this point: carbon offsets are a market for lemons where the most meaningless offset will be the cheapest (because it requires doing no work) and real offsets will be sidelined or driven out of business. https://pluralistic.net/2020/12/12/fairy-use-tale/#greenwash... If you don't have a solar panel sticking out of your Filecoin server directly powering it, I don't trust it, I assume it's some sort of shell game. Relatedly, how will I be able to hold you accountable, if every project I use ends up using Filecoin or something like it, so I can't avoid it? At some point, consumer choice will be as imaginary as it is when opposing multinational conglomerates: https://pluralistic.net/2021/03/24/greenwashing/
Let me be clear, this is not an attack on your intentions, I'm sure that you as a person have ethics and there are ethical people working with you who do not wish to destroy the world.
Several months ago, a local low-waste shop was using carbon offsets on their shipping, and I noticed they were using the exact fake Nature Conservancy offset exposed here: https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2020-nature-conservancy-c... I mentioned its uselessness to them, and they thanked me for the info, and continued to use it. I think they mean well, but running their business (which I otherwise like and support) is higher priority for them than navigating the details of carbon offsets, or researching all of their limitations. So they send money to a scam, because that appearance of sustainability makes more business sense for them than the real thing.
"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it." And so I forgive you in advance for not understanding this, but I won't forget. I think your project has bad effects, no matter how well-meaning you as an individual are.
It’s worth noting that Filecoin and IPFS are independent, but mutually beneficial projects and networks. Using IPFS and Filecoin together is completely optional - as you can see by projects like Pinata, OpenBazaar, Qri, and DTube already using IPFS in the wild today.
By design, the Filecoin Network stores data on Filecoin nodes — not IPFS nodes. While we want to make these two networks even more interoperable (https://github.com/filecoin-project/specs/issues/143) — so that, for example, you could choose to supplement IPFS nodes with Filecoin nodes — we want to leave the choice up to users. There is a big opportunity to have a distributed marketplace for ensuring IPFS persistence, and multiple solutions optimizing for different use cases will likely coexist.
The problem is this is hacker news, and that post looks like it was intended for a more general audience. Thanks for providing those links, and maybe this is something you should look into: giving off a better impression on the web to fellow open source devs, persuade us to help out. /2c.
Filecoin uses about the same energy as a comparably sized data center. Specifically, Filecoin provides about 0.77% of all data center storage capacity across the world and consumes about 0.62% of total data center electricity use.
We're also ramping up our ability to help build new solar generation, including a $38M fund to build new solar projects in the US, to produce at least as much renewable energy for the grid as the network consumes.
More on this here: - https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2021/12/02/filecoin-might-have... - https://github.com/redransil/filecoin-energy-estimation/blob... - https://filecoin.energy/methodology