ELON Musk has announced Tesla will no longer accept Bitcoin as payment due to concerns about the environmental impact of the cryptocurrency.
Electric carmakers Tesla has suspended purchases using cryptocurrency Bitcoin amid concerns of its creation and use relies on fossil fuels.
In a statement posted on Twitter, Musk said: "Tesla has suspended vehicle purchases using Bitcoin. We are concerned about the rapidly increasing use of fossil fuels for Bitcoin mining and transactions, especially coal, which has the worst emissions of any fuel.
"Cryptocurrency is a good idea on many levels and we believe it has a promising future, but this cannot come at a great cost to the environment.
"Tesla will not be selling any Bitcoin and we intend to use it for transactions as soon as mining transitions to more sustainable energy.
"We are also looking at other cryptocurrencies that use <1% of Bitcoin's energy/transaction."
Tesla & Bitcoin pic.twitter.com/YSswJmVZhP
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 12, 2021
Cryptocurrencies have long come under fire for sustainability due to the huge amount of computing power and energy needed to complete transactions.
You can earn Bitcoin by mining without having to pay for it. Bitcoin miners earn rewards for verifying blocks of transactions that are then added to the blockchain.
A Royal Society report last year said regulators such as the Financial Conduct Authority should develop guidance on the energy proportionality of digital technology, such as Bitcoin, which “wastes huge amounts of energy” by being highly compute-intensive.
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