Bitcoin and it's consequences

Environmental Crisis.

Elon Musk, one of the most vocal supporters of Bitcoin, recently took a U-turn and issued a statement informing that Tesla won't be accepting Bitcoin as a form of payment. What prompted this action?

"We are concerned about the rapidly increasing use of fossil fuel for mining and transaction, especially coal, which has the worst emission of any fuel."

Bitcoin mining is the process of creating a new virtual coin that involves computers to solve complex algorithms. this process ends up using tons of electricity. The miners use powerful systems to mine blocks and verify transactions. That is why they have to rely on chunks of electricity. To avail electricity in these quantities, fossil fuels have to be used. this is pretty bad for the environment. 

An estimate shows 120 Terawatts of electricity is being used per year to mine bitcoins, which even more than the total consumption of many countries. And these are being produced with fossil fuels. These produce huge carbon emissions. Bitcoins alone can produce enough carbon dioxide to push global warming by another 2°C in less than 2-3 decades.