How to Farm Chiacoin, the New Eco-Friendly Cryptocurrency

E arlier this month, Tesla CEO Elon Musk made a splash (and briefly tanked Bitcoin’s price) when he announced that his company would no longer accept the popular cryptocurrency as tender for its electric cars. Why not? In a tweet, Musk shared that the company “is concerned about rapidly increasing use of fossil fuels for Bitcoin mining and transactions, especially coal, which has the worst emissions of any fuel.” Cryptocurrencies are “a good idea on many levels,” Musk’s tweet said, but “this cannot come at a great cost to the environment.”

He’s right — traditional cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin are an environmental disaster. As of February of 2021, the BBC reported that the bitcoin network uses more electricity than the country of Argentina. The Sierra Club says that “Bitcoin produces 36.95 megatons of carbon dioxide (CO2) annually” and that “as digital currencies potentially continue to increase in popularity, their environmental impact should not be overlooked.”

Chiacoin, a new cryptocurrency that fully launched in May of 2021, aims to change the association between cryptocurrencies and environmental damage. According to Chia, the organization behind it, while traditional cryptocurrency requires “expensive single use hardware that consumes exorbitant amounts of electricity,” Chiacoin is “mitigating this problem through a fair, eco-friendly, and better blockchain.” In short, Chia sees Chiacoin as a greener (and potentially more secure) alternative to existing cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin.

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