Environmentalist Margot Paez describes Bitcoin’s own journey and how inclusiveness is not just a “woke ideology.”
As Bitcoiners, we often repeat the mantra “Bitcoin fixes this” and indeed, it solves many problems. The problem with this phrase is not whether Bitcoin fixes it, but the question, “for whom?” If we find ourselves in an echo chamber, then we keep the benefits of Bitcoin and what it can do for everyone.
Margot Paez is a brilliant environment and outspoken Bitcoiner. Paez received a master’s degree in physics and ethnomusicology and is currently completing a PhD in civil engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He has proven to be one of the MVPs in Bitcoin due to his extensive research on the intersection of Bitcoin mining and energy usage. They continue to devote time and resources to providing a complex framework to influence bipartisan Bitcoin policy.
Paez delivers a unique perspective that is unmatched in the Bitcoin space. In October 2022, Paez spoke on a panel titled, “Can Bitcoin Help Save the Planet?” at the UK Bitcoin Conference in Scotland. Not only does he contribute fun facts about Bitcoin mining and the environment, but he does so in an eloquent and accessible way. He is an avid Bitcoiner in a community where various subcultures can, at times, obscure important truths. Paez is doing an amazing job helping make Bitcoin accessible to everyone.
He and I had the opportunity to discuss some hot topics, such as Bitcoin mining and energy consumption, whether Bitcoin is really bad as many progressives think it is and whether or not there is a male-dominated skew in Bitcoin.
How did you learn about Bitcoin and what attracted you to it?
I first learned about Bitcoin in early 2010′. It was a Slashdot post or when WikiLeaks decided to use Bitcoin after (Julian) Assange was killed from the banking system. There are Bitcoiners at the “Audit The Fed” rally happening at Occupy Los Angeles. There are two things I remember from the show. First, there was a man with Bitcoin stickers on his things, which I photographed, and second, a man burning dollar bills, which I also filmed.
Occupy brought people from different backgrounds together over the hatred of the banks. Sometime before 2014, I actually tried bitcoin mining, but I really didn’t get the point and thought it was just another open source project. I was interested in hardware and mesh networks at the time and did not think there was much more for the money than some people did not have enough of it.
This all changed in 2018 when I saw content creators being deplatformed. Some are creators I like and others are people I don’t like. I learned quickly that in order to accept payments online, you really only have two options: PayPal or Stripe. If you lose access to one of these, you could be shut out of the payment processing network entirely. Once you’re on the bad list, you stay there for five years, and the credit card company manages the list. In response to this, I built a content creation platform that integrates BTCPay Server. This forced me to learn how to send and receive money using bitcoin and that’s really when I started taking Bitcoin seriously. It’s a long journey, but part of it is that I don’t have a foundation in economics or monetary history to build from scratch. I’m just a naive computer nerd who loves the freedom and openness of the internet. Bitcoin, for me, helps keep the internet free.
As an environmentalist, what is your perspective on how Bitcoin, specifically bitcoin mining, positively or negatively affects the environment?
Bitcoin is a technology. It can be good, it can be bad. What we do is what determines the positive or negative effects on the planet and humanity. Some miners choose to grow rapidly without thinking about their environmental impact. Thankfully, the way proof-of-work works is to have a built-in mechanism to maintain this high time preference. So while we’ve seen miners make bad choices in the past, I think miners are starting to realize that they’re going to die if they grow too fast. As a result, there is hope that Bitcoin can have a positive impact on the environment. The existing monetary and economic system does not work this way. The existing system only prioritizes the present over the future. Promoted quickly and maximized profits at all costs. There is no mechanism to eliminate players who do not think long term or who take too many risks. More importantly, with proof of work, there is no guarantee for miners failing.
Due to the fact that bitcoin miners are forced to find the cheapest electricity, feel the downward pressure due to difficulty adjustment and the dynamics of the competitive market close to mining, they are driven to waste energy. This turns out to be very beneficial for the environment because many sources of this energy are bio-methane like in landfills, livestock waste and so on. Anthropogenic methane is the second largest source of global warming, second only to carbon dioxide. If we are trying to avoid a tipping point, then we want to try to buy ourselves some time and reduce the heating potential for a short period of time. Bitcoin miners are very flexible and location agnostic. They were able to monetize the early stages of a methane capture system that captures methane gas and turns it into electricity.
In a market economy, referring to solar and wind power generators that have to compete when producing power, how can they survive if the price of their product drops to zero or even negative in some markets? Bitcoin miners can help support these renewable electricity generators as a secondary source of income that boosts investment. Several companies have tried to do this. The problem is that the energy industry is studying the use case of bitcoin mining and it takes time. The anti-bitcoin political environment and cryptocurrency scams like FTX make potential partners wary of miners. This is unfortunate because it is a missed opportunity to achieve decarbonisation goals.
An electricity grid that is transitioning from conventional thermal electricity generators like coal and natural gas to renewable energy sources like solar and wind requires lateral flexibility. Bitcoin miners are useful and can help stabilize the grid so more wind and solar can come online.
How do you usually respond to Bitcoin naysayers? How would you succinctly present the case for Bitcoin from a progressive point of view?
I have had very little success in my own circle of friends. They are all too dogmatic about their beliefs about the economic system to think that bitcoin could be of any use to them. In fact, I still hide all my Bitcoin stickers and copies of Bitcoin Magazine when my non-Bitcoin friends come over. I’m probably a coward, but I just don’t have many friends in real life, I can’t afford to lose them through Bitcoin. The best argument I can give is for those who are not emotionally involved with our economic problems and are willing to listen to a different opinion: Bitcoin has social value for anyone who has ever been locked out of the banking system or has a bank. deposits were frozen and stolen from them. It has the ability to unlock wasted energy, meaning it can help reduce methane emissions and buy time. If you don’t like what you see, then you should understand that, fundamentally, Bitcoin has no ideology and anyone can participate. More individuals using bitcoin who care about climate change and the environment means that the likelihood that Bitcoin will do good for the climate and the planet as a whole increases. Bitcoin for anyone, Bitcoin for the enemy.
In your opinion, why is it important to close the gender gap in Bitcoin interest and adoption?
I think when Bitcoiners show up they say, “Bitcoin is for everyone! It’s inclusive! It’s for people in the Global South!” and those who try to convince see a room full of white Americans and Europeans, it leads to the question of what Bitcoin is really for whom. Part of this is a messaging problem. Part of finance and technology is, unfortunately, a male-dominated field.
However, if Bitcoin is truly for anyone or everyone, then we need to see more people representing Bitcoin who are women, who are people of color, who are LGBTQ+, who are disabled and so on. I know some people out there are offended by this and think it’s some “woke ideology,” but it really isn’t. Bitcoin adoption will struggle if we don’t have the right ambassadors. It’s just a fact. Sometimes reality hurts fragile egos, but that doesn’t make them any less true.
This is a guest post by Becca Bratcher. Opinions expressed are entirely their own and do not necessarily reflect those of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Magazine.