According to Bitcoin analyst and advocate Luke Broyles, the journey to mining the final Satoshi, the smallest unit of Bitcoin, will be unprecedented in digital history.
According to Broyles, the energy required to mine the final singular Bitcoin will surpass the combined energy it took to mine the first 20,000,000 BTC. He predicts that producing the final Bitcoin could consume energy over the entire first third of the 22nd century.
In this light, Broyles claims the final Satoshi will demand infinite energy to create, whether this is meant figuratively remains unknown. In his view, Bitcoin’s model of digital scarcity is designed to blow out to infinite difficulty to create an endpoint few would understand, according to Broyles.
A Bitcoin halving occurs approximately every four years. With each event, the mining rewards are reduced by half, and the mining process becomes even slower and tends to consume more resources. The most recent halving event reduced the Bitcoin mining reward to 3.125 BTC, and the next halving will reduce it to 1.5625 BTC.
1.15 million Bitcoin left to mine
Bitcoin’s supply is pegged at 21 million coins. Of the 21 million total Bitcoins, 19.85 million have already been mined, leaving approximately 1.15 million remaining.
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Because of Bitcoin’s halving occurrence, it will most certainly take years to mine the remaining coins. The last Bitcoin to be produced and released into circulation is predicted by the end of the year 2140, ensuring that the Bitcoin mining process slows down in the market over time.
After mining is completed, no new Bitcoins will be released into the market. The miners will then use transaction fees to validate transactions and maintain the blockchain.
Bitcoin was trading at $94,181 at the time of writing, having previously reached an all-time high of $109,114 in January.