The Bitcoin Energy Debate: Lessons from the Data Center Industry Some of the more than 4,000 cryptocurrency ASIC miners in Riot Blockchain mining facility. (Image: PRNewsfoto/Riot Blockchain, Inc.) There’s a vigorous debate underway about the environmental impact of Bitcoin, featuring strong opinions from both critics and defenders of cryptocurrency mining. We’ve seen this debate before, and we know how it probably ends. The data center industry faced similar critiques in 2010-11, when its use of coal-powered energy came under fire from Greenpeace and The New York Times. Ten years later, the data center industry is the largest user of renewable energy on the planet. Cloud computing platforms from Google, Microsoft, Facebook and Amazon Web Services are among the biggest buyers of wind and solar energy, followed closely by data center service providers Equinix, Switch, QTS Data Centers and Digital Realty.