Electricity Consumption is the total quantity of electrical energy used by a system over a period, typically measured in kilowatt- or terawatt-hours. For blockchains it quantifies the energy drawn by mining, validation, and node operation, and is a central metric in debates over their environmental impact. Indices such as the Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index estimate network-wide consumption from hardware and hashrate data.
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- For proof-of-work networks, consumption scales with hashrate and the efficiency of mining hardware, while proof-of-stake networks consume orders of magnitude less. Accurate estimation combines hashrate, hardware mix, and power-usage assumptions, informing sustainability policy and carbon-footprint accounting.