Greta Thunberg will be pleased - the EU may ban the mining of popular cryptocurrencies due to the impact on the environment

Chinese miners, some of whom moved to Europe after the ban on cryptocurrency mining in China, may be in for an unpleasant surprise. The EU has also raised the issue of introducing a moratorium on the production of digital currency.

What we know

The reason is the bad impact of mining on the environment. Some time ago, the Swedish authorities sent in the EU a corresponding letter. It has now become known that Erik Thedin, Governor of the Riksbank of Sweden and Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the European Securities Market Supervisory Authority, called for a ban on the production of digital coins in the EU.

Note that we are talking only about mining using the Proof-of-Work consensus algorithm. The issue of banning the mining of coins implemented on Proof-of-Stake is not currently on the agenda. This algorithm is different in that the holders of virtual coins are responsible for the operation of the blockchain without the need to perform complex calculations.

Of the popular cryptocurrencies based on Proof-of-Work, Dogecoin and Ethereum still work. True, it won't stay that way for long. The developers of DOGE plan to transfer the digital currency to Proof-of-Stake “soon”, and Ethereum will switch to a new algorithm this year, while the full implementation of the roadmap will take about six years.

Source: Financial Times