Cryptocurrency has been quite the buzz over past few years, and you might have least heard something about it in some capacity, whether you researched Bitcoin on your own, heard about it at a family dinner or saw a billionaire post memes about it.

Either way, chances are many of us know about cryptocurrency to some degree. However, you might not know that crypto, specifically bitcoin mining, can take quite a toll on our environment. Luckily, as bitcoin mining continues to be a booming business, some of its top companies are working on ways to accomplish sustainable bitcoin mining. Leading the way in that regard is EZ Blockchain, a Bitcoin mining company that puts sustainability promptly at the front of its business plans.

Now, bitcoin mining takes a toll on our environment in a few different ways but amongst those, energy consumption and fossil fuel dependence may be at the top of the list. Bitcoin mining uses a considerable amount of energy which, in turn, uses up a lot of fossil fuels such as coal and natural gas, releasing greenhouse gases such as methane into the atmosphere. Often, the energy consumption of bitcoin mining is compared to that of an entire country’s worth of usage. A 2022 report estimated that bitcoin mining may be responsible for 65.4 megatonnes of CO2 per year, comparable to the emissions for all of Greece, just for reference.

EZ Blockchain is one company flipping the script on the impacts of Bitcoin mining and is innovating new ways to use waste to power its operations.

Over the last six years, EZ Blockchain has dug deep into underutilized energy and found a niche where Bitcoin mining can support the energy industry. For example, EZ Blockchain transforms wasted gas into energy for Bitcoin mining without installing new infrastructure at a facility. It can also repurpose wasted energy from Solar grids and wind turbines to power its mining efforts.

The goal that EZ Blockchain set for themselves was simple, mine bitcoin but do it in a positive way for the environment.

“We market a lot about bitcoin, but we use bitcoin mining as a technology to show [facilities] that yes, bitcoin mining utilizes a lot of power, but we can use this as a feature, not a bug,” said Sergii Gerasymovych, EZ Blockchain founder and CEO. “We can utilize [energy] in the areas where that would help the environment as well as help the community.”

What sets EZ Blockchain apart from the competition is that it optimizes its operations and stays tightly integrated with the energy markets. EZ Blockchain wants to work as an extra service to providers rather than coming in and buying up power. Since transmission lines lack interconnection, a lot of energy is wasted as of now. Still, EZ Blockchain works with these facilities, pays for that energy, and takes what was going to be a lost power source and turns it into sustainable Bitcoin mining.

EZ Blockchain isn’t shy about its commitment to sustainability. A quick look at its website would tell you as much. Gerasymovych said it’s important to educate the public and facilities on their work so it can be properly understood that they’re helping the communities, environment and the success they’ve had working with utility companies.

“We have one of our facilities in the Kansas area. There’s a lot of wind energy there but there are not enough consumers in that area. So, we come in there, we buy that [excess] power, and we pay taxes, which is distributed around the community,” said Gerasymovych.

“Our ethics is to be a good part of the community.”

The bottom line for EZ Blockchain is that its operations use unwanted energy, its operations create jobs for locals, and its paying taxes. It’s quite a strong commitment from a company that may be grouped into the morally grey area of Bitcoin mining. Still, Gerasymovych worked tirelessly to ensure his company stood apart and above.

Going further with its commitment to sustainable Bitcoin mining, EZ Blockchain recently partnered with Sustainable Bitcoin Protocol (SBP). The partnership with SBP brings a third party to the equation that checks out exactly what a company, in this case, EZ Blockchain, does, what power it would use, and if it’s environmentally friendly. If you will, a stamp of approval that the bitcoins being mined were done so through clean bitcoin mining.

Gerasymovych made a comparison to the diamond market. Diamonds obtained through paid and moral labor and conflict-free means come with a certificate that dates the diamond back to its source. SBP is doing the same for Bitcoin mining.

“[the partnership] helps us and the industry to validate [bitcoin mining] from a different angle. Not from a biased opinion, that what we do, is clean and what we put on our website represents the truth,” said Gerasymovych.

Gerasymovych says that this partnership with SBP is where the industry is headed as other companies make these kinds of partnerships to promote sustainable Bitcoin mining. EZ blockchain is working to create a demand among community investors who want to support companies that obtain sustainability certificates. It also gives EZ Blockchain credibility when talking to local facilities about using their excess or waste energy, assuring that what EZ Blockchain is doing has a sustainability focus.

“There’s a lot of folks doing this, working on showing the world that bitcoin mining is sustainable and that many cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin specifically, are generated using clean energy,” said Gerasymovych.