124 Countries Ranked by their Green and Cheap Crypto Mining potential

Our financial and environmental policies suck

As some of us know, Proof-of-Work (PoW) cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC), Etherium v1 (ETH) and Monero (XMR) require a lot of computational power to run, and this requires electricity. The cheaper this is, the quicker the miner can recover they’re computational investment and make a profit.

In another front, humanity is in the middle of a climate crisis, which CO2 emissions are partly to blame for. The use of renewable energy such as Solar, Hydroelectric, Wind, Thermal can help to mitigate climate change in the future.

Therefore, it is my view that the most responsible thing to do is to get miners to power their rigs using renewable sources without paying a premium for it. The future of decentralized PoW cryptos depends on this decentralized network of miners who validate transactions while keeping the network safe. In this way, we can slowly but surely stray away from the current corrupt centralized financial system we depend on.

How to rank countries by their ability provide cheap and environmentally-friendly electricity

This morning in the shower I thought, "how can I make a measure to include both cheap and renewable electricity?" As such this very simple index ranks countries in its ability to provide both cheap and environmentally-friendly electricity (at least in CO2 terms). It gives equal weight to the cost of electricity in a country in terms of USD/kWh and its % of electricity coming from renewable energy sources.

I managed to get data for 124 countries from the freely available online sources noted at the bottom of the article. I made sure the weighing of the ‘cheap’ and ‘green’ component were fairly compares by statistical normalization of each, before summing them up into the final index.

124 countries ranked by the Cheap and Green Crypto Mining Index (CGCMI)

Behold the data below, ranked by score. Does your country appear ranked as you expected? What is your real mining experience there? Looking forward to hearing you opinions.

  Rank         Country          USD/kWh   % Renewables   CGMI    ------ ---------------------- --------- -------------- -------      1   Ethiopia               0.008     93.6%          1.000       2   Zambia                 0.029     95.0%          0.977       3   Paraguay               0.058     100.0%         0.961       4   Kyrgyzstan             0.01      86.7%          0.960       5   DR Congo               0.061     100.0%         0.956       6   Norway                 0.094     97.2%          0.893       7   Albania                0.11      100.0%         0.884       8   Venezuela              1E-06     67.6%          0.873       9   Angola                 0.019     70.3%          0.859      10   Georgia                0.06      80.7%          0.855      11   Namibia                0.131     99.3%          0.850      12   Iceland                0.136     100.0%         0.846      13   Costa Rica             0.141     97.7%          0.827      14   Sudan                  0.007     56.7%          0.804      15   Suriname               0.015     58.3%          0.801      16   Mozambique             0.141     83.7%          0.752      17   Brazil                 0.133     80.4%          0.746      18   Burma                  0.037     52.6%          0.738      19   Zimbabwe               0.035     51.9%          0.737      20   Uruguay                0.199     96.5%          0.735      21   Laos                   0.054     53.1%          0.716      22   Canada                 0.111     65.0%          0.696      23   Ecuador                0.096     60.2%          0.692      24   Kenya                  0.214     90.7%          0.682      25   Cameroon               0.089     52.4%          0.661      26   New Zealand            0.204     83.9%          0.660      27   Ghana                  0.062     42.9%          0.650      28   Colombia               0.139     62.9%          0.644      29   Panama                 0.161     66.6%          0.631      30   Croatia                0.161     65.2%          0.624      31   Pakistan               0.056     32.7%          0.604      32   Togo                   0.207     73.1%          0.598      33   Vietnam                0.082     38.6%          0.597      34   Sweden                 0.164     57.1%          0.576      35   Northern Macedonia     0.091     36.7%          0.574      36   Turkey                 0.079     32.9%          0.571      37   Armenia                0.081     32.2%          0.565      38   Tanzania               0.099     37.1%          0.564      39   Austria                0.237     74.3%          0.561      40   Gabon                  0.22      68.4%          0.554      41   Sri Lanka              0.074     27.7%          0.551      42   Lithuania              0.157     49.4%          0.545      43   Cambodia               0.149     47.2%          0.545      44   Argentina              0.06      21.5%          0.538      45   El Salvador            0.203     60.7%          0.538      46   Iran                   0.005     5.8%           0.535      47   Bosnia & Herz.         0.105     31.5%          0.526      48   Nigeria                0.059     18.6%          0.524      49   Cuba                   0.008     4.5%           0.524      50   Latvia                 0.19      54.2%          0.522      51   China                  0.084     24.4%          0.518      52   Honduras               0.182     50.1%          0.512      53   Kazakhstan             0.041     11.3%          0.512      54   Iraq                   0.024     6.4%           0.510      55   Russia                 0.063     16.9%          0.509      56   Peru                   0.185     50.1%          0.508      57   Libya                  0.004     0.0%           0.506      58   Malaysia               0.058     13.7%          0.500      59   Switzerland            0.226     59.8%          0.499      60   Azerbaijan             0.041     8.8%           0.498      61   India                  0.077     18.1%          0.495      62   Egypt                  0.045     8.2%           0.489      63   Nicaragua              0.212     53.3%          0.485      64   Finland                0.184     44.2%          0.478      65   Romania                0.175     41.4%          0.476      66   Chile                  0.182     43.3%          0.476      67   Mexico                 0.081     15.3%          0.474      68   Oman                   0.026     0.0%           0.473      69   Ukraine                0.048     5.6%           0.471      70   Kuwait                 0.03      0.1%           0.468      71   Qatar                  0.032     0.3%           0.466      72   Algeria                0.039     0.6%           0.457      73   Madagascar             0.115     20.8%          0.454      74   Indonesia              0.1       15.9%          0.450      75   Bahrain                0.048     0.0%           0.441      76   Saudi Arabia           0.048     0.0%           0.441      77   Trinidad & Tobago      0.052     0.0%           0.435      78   Dominican Republic     0.09      10.4%          0.435      79   Bangladesh             0.066     1.8%           0.424      80   Guatemala              0.251     51.7%          0.419      81   Tunisia                0.076     3.0%           0.416      82   Thailand               0.114     13.1%          0.414      83   Lebanon                0.077     2.8%           0.413      84   Belarus                0.075     1.2%           0.408      85   Portugal               0.27      53.5%          0.401      86   Ivory Coast            0.13      15.0%          0.401      87   Morocco                0.131     14.8%          0.398      88   Bulgaria               0.137     15.7%          0.394      89   United Arab Emirates   0.081     0.3%           0.394      90   Philippines            0.169     24.3%          0.393      91   Jordan                 0.1       4.9%           0.391      92   Taiwan                 0.101     4.2%           0.386      93   Moldova                0.106     5.3%           0.384      94   Serbia                 0.094     2.0%           0.384      95   Hungary                0.125     10.1%          0.382      96   Spain                  0.23      38.1%          0.377      97   USA                    0.148     14.7%          0.373      98   Slovenia               0.21      30.6%          0.367      99   Malta                  0.157     15.6%          0.364     100   South Korea            0.111     2.8%           0.363     101   Botswana               0.109     0.2%           0.353     102   Denmark                0.335     60.5%          0.343     103   Slovakia               0.204     24.5%          0.343     104   Estonia                0.161     12.5%          0.342     105   Greece                 0.217     27.4%          0.339     106   Italy                  0.261     37.3%          0.328     107   Australia              0.228     27.7%          0.325     108   South Africa           0.147     3.2%           0.313     109   Poland                 0.192     15.5%          0.312     110   United Kingdom         0.26      33.0%          0.306     111   Netherlands            0.187     12.1%          0.302     112   Senegal                0.185     10.4%          0.295     113   France                 0.214     17.5%          0.291     114   Singapore              0.169     1.6%           0.272     115   Israel                 0.175     2.5%           0.268     116   Luxembourg             0.247     20.8%          0.260     117   Germany                0.364     46.2%          0.224     118   Ireland                0.292     24.7%          0.215     119   Czech Republic         0.245     11.3%          0.212     120   Japan                  0.259     15.0%          0.211     121   Cyprus                 0.238     8.7%           0.209     122   Belgium                0.311     16.6%          0.144     123   Jamaica                0.292     8.2%           0.127     124   Benin                  0.36      3.2%           0.000  

Methodology:

Countries with unavailable data were filtered out. Both electricity price data and %renewable data was normalized (link to normalization, wiki). The CGCMI is the addition of the normalized electricity price and normalized %renewable, and then normalized to range between 0 and 1.

Sources:

Electricity price data for December 2020, retrieved 17/08/21 from https://www.globalpetrolprices.com/electricity_prices/

% Electricity from renewable sources data for November 2018, retrieved 17/08/21 from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_renewable_electricity_production. This data is supposedly from https://iea.org