Ethereum upgrades technology to cut CO2 output by 99%: Report

Ethereum has completed a key revamp of its blockchain network, marking the crypto world’s most-ambitious software upgrade to date. As a result, Ethereum’s carbon consumption will decline by an estimated 99 per cent. Called the Merge, the upgrade completed in the early hours of Thursday, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin tweeted.

The change replaced power-hungry computers that were used to order transactions on the network with a more energy-efficient set-up using piles of the network’s native token, Ether, placed in special, so-called staking wallets.

Such an upheaval had never been attempted in crypto before, let alone on Ethereum, home to about 3,500 active decentralised apps, ranging from exchanges to games and handling billions of dollars worth of crypto.