Does bitcoin use less energy than Christmas lights? Fact-checking a dubious claim

Photo by Joetography LLC on Flickr. CC-BY-SA licenced.

If there’s one thing that bitcoin enthusiasts are a mite touchy about, it’s people pointing out that their favoured product uses a colossal amount of electricity every day in the pursuit of printing a winning lottery ticket. (That is the essential boiled-down version of what bitcoin mining is; part of that process also verifies blockchain…