The hotly anticipated "merge" by Ethereum (or The
Merge) has finally happened. The net result is that Ethereum has
changed from "Proof of Work" mining to "Proof of
Stake" validation, as its consensus mechanism to verify new
transactions, add them to the blockchain, and create new tokens.
This is a win for sustainability because of the significant energy
reduction in Proof of Stake compared with Proof of Work. For global
organisations who are looking to take action on sustainability as
well as tip their toes into the growing DeFi space, this can only
be a welcome move.
It is still early days though. As with any major software
upgrade, perhaps more so because of the potential economic effects
of distributed networks to transfer stores of value, the
implications need to be worked through and understood.
