The European Union should ban the energy-intensive system used to mine Bitcoin, one of the bloc's leading financial regulators has said.
In an interview with the Financial Times, vice-chair of the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) Erik Thedéen called for a bloc-wide ban on "proof of work" crypto mining, saying the industry's energy usage was becoming a "national issue" in his native Sweden.
"Bitcoin is now a national issue for Sweden because of the amount of renewable energy devoted to mining," Thedéen told the FT.
Bitcoin now consumes 0.6 per cent of the world's electricity, according to figures from the Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index.
