In a couple of weeks, Ethereum is slated to endure essentially the most vital change in its seven-year historical past. Until now, the Ethereum blockchain has been secured utilizing a way known as “proof-of-work,” which consumes extra electrical energy than your complete nation of Belgium. Next month’s swap to a brand new technique known as “proof-of-stake” is predicted to chop Ethereum’s power consumption by an element of 1,000.

The stakes are excessive. A botched transition may imply chaos for the various crypto initiatives constructed on high of Ethereum. A clean transition could be the fruits of years of cautious planning by Ethereum’s core builders. Over the final yr, builders have repeatedly pushed again the date of “the Merge” to present themselves extra time to arrange. They accomplished a ultimate costume rehearsal on August 10, clearing the way in which to make the swap in mid-September.

The most fast consequence of a profitable Merge can be to place the world’s Ethereum miners out of labor. Over the final seven years, hundreds of individuals have purchased high-end graphics playing cards to assist keep the Ethereum blockchain—and to earn newly created ether within the course of. The new system for updating the Ethereum blockchain would not require the identical sort of beefy {hardware}—or the large electrical energy invoice that goes with it. So the value of used graphics playing cards may proceed to fall as Ethereum miners exit the business.

But the swap to proof-of-stake is far more than simply an energy-saving measure—it is a main overhaul of the Ethereum community. Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin believes the Merge will lay the muse for a collection of future upgrades that may permit the community to deal with a a lot bigger quantity of transactions within the coming years. But critics fear that the brand new scheme may trigger the Ethereum community to turn into overly centralized—and therefore susceptible to authorities regulation.

From proof-of-work to proof-of-stake

At a excessive degree of abstraction, this is how any blockchain works: Someone on the community proposes a block containing a listing of current transactions. Then different community contributors confirm that the block follows the community’s guidelines. If a enough variety of different community contributors settle for the block, it turns into the “official” subsequent block within the chain. As lengthy as most community contributors are sincere, customers can believe that transactions accepted by a majority of the community will not be eliminated or modified later.

The massive problem for any blockchain challenge is stopping a malicious social gathering from creating many sock puppet accounts to “stuff the poll field,” outvote the sincere contributors and thereby tamper with previous transactions. Bitcoin’s pseudonymous founder Satoshi Nakamoto’s massive perception—the one which made bitcoin attainable—was that this drawback might be solved utilizing the precept of “one hash, one vote.” On the bitcoin community, whoever has essentially the most computing energy—particularly, the capability to compute SHA-256 hashes—has essentially the most affect over which blocks get added to the blockchain. As lengthy as sincere miners have extra hash energy than malicious miners, customers may be assured within the integrity of the blockchain—and therefore within the integrity of funds made utilizing the bitcoin community. (Check out our in-depth bitcoin explainer for particulars on how this works.)

When Vitalik Buterin launched Ethereum in 2015, he used a variant of Nakamoto’s scheme. By that time, bitcoin mining was already dominated by specialised silicon optimized for computing big numbers of SHA-256 hashes, locking unusual bitcoiners out of the mining sport. So Buterin developed a new mining algorithm designed to be “memory-hard”—and due to this fact troublesome to speed up with customized {hardware}. As a consequence, Ethereum mining continues to be largely carried out utilizing off-the-shelf graphics playing cards, permitting unusual Ethereum customers to take part.

But the economics of the 2 networks are essentially comparable. As the values of bitcoin and ether have risen, it has turn into worthwhile for individuals to spend an increasing number of cash on mining {hardware}—and electrical energy—to generate new cash. While this has made the networks safer, it has additionally meant that each networks devour astronomical quantities of electrical energy and therefore drive an increasing number of carbon emissions.

The bitcoin and Ethereum communities have responded to this situation very in a different way. Satoshi Nakamoto disappeared from public view in 2011. In his absence, bitcoin’s tradition has turn into more and more conservative. Many bitcoiners adamantly oppose altering bitcoin’s mining system, fearing that modifications may open the door to centralization and supreme authorities management. As a consequence, bitcoin is unlikely to maneuver away from proof-of-work within the foreseeable future.