The Bear Market is for the builders, the ones who carve out their own path, creating technology that
will change the future of tomorrow. They don’t shill, they don’t cry…they have their heads down
building and making the connections that will secure their blockchain infrastructure will
be used on scales we couldn’t even imagine. So are you ready to see who’s building like
Bob the Builder? Well you don’t really have a choice, because it’s time for Chico Crypto!!
Sooo, to begin this episode let’s talk a little bit about Bitcoin.
Late last week, Thursday to be exact, Bloomberg Law dropped this
article “Crypto Miners’ Energy, Climate Costs Draw White House Scrutiny”
Yikes, is the whitehouse coming after Bitcoin?? Well that was a good title,
to make it look like it, but if you dive deeper you get a clearer picture of what they are doing.
The article states “The Biden administration is teeing up policy recommendations to lower
cryptocurrency mining’s energy consumption and emissions footprint” ““It’s important,
if this is going to be part of our financial system in any meaningful way, that it’s developed
responsibly and minimizes total emissions,” Costa Samaras, principal assistant director for
energy for the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, told Bloomberg Law. The study
aims to drill down into claims that have touted cryptocurrency as a societal benefit or criticized
it as a local nuisance and a climate nightmare, said Samaras. The team will study claims made in
recent months—in places like Texas—that mining facilities could provide grid operators with
flexibility by agreeing to temporarily shut down during times of peak demand.”
Sooo, the aim of this is to reduce bitcoin and crypto mining energy consumption
and the emissions footprint. They will study claims that Bitcoin mining
is an energy hog or it can be a benefit to the environment and grid.
Sooo I wonder who could be helping with this? Well in the same Bloomberg Law article,
they not only got comments from Costa Samaras, but from another person. Jesse Morris, CEO
of Energy Web. From the article ““I have a really hard time seeing some sort of a stick approach,”
said Jesse Morris, CEO of Energy Web, a technology company that works with utilities and consumers to
accelerate decarbonization. “I think the most bang for their buck is going to be on education
and disclosure of bitcoin mining—and that would send a huge signal, too.”
Last month, Energy Web unveiled a scoring system that would show how Bitcoin miners—and
potential other industries—are using their consumption to drive lower emissions.
Well, just as this article was released Jesse Morris tweeted “Major opportunity for
WhiteHouse to partner with the BTC community and transform corporate
renewable purchasing & disclosure. Via energyweb and RockyMtnInst approach
we can incentivize companies to buy renewables that produce the deepest carbon benefits.
Now, is this just a coincidence Jesse is featured in the article and tweeting
about it on the same day? Or does Energy Web have connections to the whitehouse?
Well I’ll let you in on a little secret…it’s the latter. Energy Web
has direct connections to the Whitehouse on multiple levels.
Sooo to begin, let’s look at a certain person who worked for Energy Web. As we can see from
the July 2019 whitepaper, Claire Henly was a part of the Energy Web Foundation,
and contributed to the creation of the whitepaper.
Well this Yale Business profile on Claire gives us a clear picture
of what she worked on. It says “Claire Henly directs the Energy Web Foundation's
technology deployment work, developing the frameworks, technical standards
and best practices necessary to drive adoption of blockchain technology by the energy sector.
Her portfolio includes EW Origin – a secure, low cost, public tracking system
for renewable energy credits, EW Link – a set of standards and best practices to connect
distributed energy assets to the blockchain, and the D3A Simulation – a tool to evaluate
the economic impacts of a blockchain based transactive energy model for electricity grids.”
She contributed to the creation of the 3 highly important Energy Web technologies. EW Origin,
EW Link, and the D3A…which is now known as the Grid Singularity energy exchange.
Although, before Energy Web we can see from the profile,
she worked for RMI, the Rocky Mountain Institute, for a whopping 5 years…and if you didn’t know,
Rocky mountain is one of the two co-founders, of Energy Web along with Grid Singularity…
So there is no doubt Claire is connected to Energy Web on a level that goes nearly
a decade deep!! I wonder what Claire did while working for Energy Web?
Well in 2018, she testified before the US Senate on using blockchain in the Energy Sector…well
did she stop there with the government? No, No, No my friends…she joined the government….
Checking out her Linked’n we can see works for the Whitehouse as a whitehouse fellow,
serving in the executive office of the president.
Placed on the special Envoy for the climate, being a direct assistant to John Kerry.
Energy Web has a mole in the Whitehouse…so
the next question is are they working on anything together?
Well, we gotta go back to this tweet from Energy Web coufounder, RMI,
back in February of this year. RMI retweeted the whitehouse and a press release from them
on the buy clean task force. RMI said “The new Buy Clean Task Force will support low-carbon materials
made in American factories. RMIemissions is working to advance the decarbonization of
industrial materials supply chains with blockchain tech and data transparency. Onward! WhiteHouse”
Hmmmmm…now if we dive into the press release they retweeted and scroll to the section on
the buy clean taskforce, the whitehouse says this regarding it “The Council on
Environmental Quality and White House Office of Domestic Climate Policy are establishing
the first-ever Buy Clean Task Force, which will harness the federal government’s
massive purchasing power to support low-carbon materials made in American factories.
So who is helping make this a reality? Well they say “and the State Department and U.S. Special
Presidential Envoy for Climate are securing corporate purchasing commitments
for low-carbon materials and technologies through the First Movers Coalition”
Yes, the US special presidential envoy for climate, the same one
Claire Henly was appointed to, as direct assistant to John Kerry….
So is RMI and Energy Web building this? Well, going back to RMI’s retweet of the press release
we can see below RMI says “We use #blockchain to help our friends new
to this tech understand the main message. We're proud to partner with Energy Web on this work!”
So what is the work?? Well remember the Whitehouse Buy Clean Task Force is made to support low carbon
materials made in American factories. Going to RMIs website and their Supply Chain emissions
initiatives, we can see they highlight something called COMET…which is creating a
universal greenhouse gas calculation framework that can be used in all industrial supply chains.
Now if you scroll down, they say this too under digital infrastructure and exchanges
“Improving emissions accuracy by working with the Energy Web Foundation to create a blockchain
platform that will digitally track emissions through a supply chain”
Sooo does COMET have any government connections?? Of course it does. RMI is in direct contract with
the SEC, in regards to the President's executive orders on Climate. Here is the letter from RMI to
the SEC. They say “I am pleased to submit comments in response to the Request for Public Input on
Climate Change Disclosure on behalf of RMI. We are encouraged by President Biden's Executive Order on
Climate Related Financial Risk and the G7 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors Communique.
The Securities and Exchange Commission's (SEC) commitment to enhance corporate
disclosure on climate risks will be critical to support these important
commitments and help mitigate systemic risks associated with climate change.
Now guess who had a talk in February of which the SEC attended? February 24th,
Energy Web hosted the Make Money Green ESG & Financial Regulation event and yup, as you can
see the SEC was there…specifically commissioner Allison Herren Lee, as an official guest.
Now remember the beginning of this episode, it was the whitehouse investigating bitcoin
mining…well look at what we have here. A pinned tweet by RMI, released last month
May 9th…It says “Proud to announce a new approach to decarbonize electricity-intensive industries
in partnership w/ Energy Web. The approach is applicable to any sector and EW is currently
trialing the approach in the crypto sector with a link to learn more about their case study.
Going to this….yup it’s green proofs for BTC. It says “to maximize the impact of renewables
used to power Bitcoin and bring greater transparency to the networks carbon footprint,
Green Proofs for BTC combines Energy Web’s Green Proofs technology solution with a new assessment
approach co created with GMI for determining the impact of different renewable energy purchases”
How do you like them apples? Green apples to be specific!! Cheers I’ll see you next time!