NRK has visited Kryptovault in Hønefoss in Norway.

Krytpovault claims that it’s better that they mine Bitcoin in Norway using green energy. Kryptovault claim that if they aren’t mining Bitcoin, someone else will, and they probably won’t use the same green envergy.

Except, that’s not how Bitcoin mining works. Someone else isn’t going to not mine Bitcoin just because Kryptovault is doing it in Norway, they are going to mine Bitcoin regardless. Kryptovault isn’t preventing anyone from mining with fossil fuels, they are just contributing to the total global power consumption spent on mining.

And it gets even worse. Kryptovault is also contributing to the total count of nodes, or computers, in the Bitcoin mining network. Bitcoin is designed in such a way that adding more nodes to the network, makes all the nodes in the network work harder.

Bitcoin is generated, or mined, by solving complex mathematical equations (in simple terms). It’s programmed to generate a small amount of currency approximately every 10 minutes, regardless of how many nodes are in the network.

That means that the more nodes there are in the network, the more difficult the equations have to be. More nodes working on the same problem, means it will be solved quicker. To slow down the solve time, the equations get more complex the more nodes are on the network. This leads to each node spending more time doing calculations not resulting in a payout.

In other words: Kryptovault in Norway aren’t only not contributing to fewer mining operations, they’re also making all the other operations spend more energy per Bitcoin mined. Kryptovault might be running on green power, but they’re making all the rigs running on fossil fuels consume more fossil fuel per Bitcoin mined.