Kerby Anderson

American media is paying more attention to how we use energy, but sometimes there is value in putting some of the estimates into perspective. First, a confession. I am the person in our household who is always going around turning off lights and TVs when nobody is in the room. I am all about saving energy.

It is a sad fact that we as a nation and we as a planet waste more energy than we use. Just look at the energy flow diagram put out by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

At the same time, we also need to set aside some of the hyperbole in the media about energy usage. Seven years ago, The Guardian warned that “viral cat videos are warming the planet.” Five years ago, Newsweek predicted that “Bitcoin Mining is on Track to Consume All the World’s Energy by 2020.”

By the way, in case you are wondering, The Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance estimates that Bitcoin consumes about 0.55% of global energy production. Another calculation estimates that Bitcoin is responsible for merely 0.085% of global CO2 emissions. That is because Bitcoin miners often use stranded energy, as well as inexpensive renewal energy.

Let me now focus on a massive use of energy rarely discussed: pornography. Internet usage accounts for about 10 percent of the world’s total electricity consumption (and is estimated to be 20 percent in a few years). About 35 percent of the Internet bandwidth is pornography.

Multiply those numbers together and you have three and a half percent. 3.5% of world energy usage is devoted to porn pictures and videos. This is larger than any of the percentages often mentioned in news articles. That’s why we need some discernment when reading about energy usage headlines.