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CO2 to Mine 1 Bitcoin by Province (Canada): The Grid Decides

“Is Bitcoin mining bad for the climate?” is the wrong question. The right one is where. A miner is just an electric load, so the carbon it emits is whatever its grid emits — and Canadian grids span three orders of magnitude, from Quebec and Manitoba hydro at barely 1 gram of CO₂ per kWh to coal-heavy Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia in the hundreds. This dataset multiplies each province’s average grid carbon intensity by the network electricity needed to mine one whole bitcoin to show, transparently, the kilograms of CO₂ to mine 1 BTC where you actually plug in.

Quick answer

Whether Bitcoin mining is "dirty" depends almost entirely on WHERE it plugs in. Mining one whole bitcoin takes the same ~728,258 kWh network-wide for a current-gen S21-class miner (hashrate cancels out) — but the CO2 that electricity emits swings with the local grid. In Quebec, whose grid runs on hydro ~94% at ~1.2 gCO2eq/kWh, mining one BTC emits about 0.9 tonnes of CO2. On Nova Scotia's coal/petcoke ~50% + gas + wind + imported hydro grid (~660 gCO2eq/kWh) the same coin emits about 481 tonnes — roughly 552x more.

The carbon footprint of mining is a property of the GRID, not of Bitcoin. Canada's hydro provinces (Quebec, Manitoba, BC) are among the cleanest places on Earth to mine — which is exactly why keeping that cheap, clean power at home instead of pricing miners out is a sovereignty question, not just an economic one. Figures use average operational grid intensity; a new load can draw dirtier marginal power (see method). Free CSV/JSON under CC BY 4.0.

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CO2 to mine one whole BTC with a current-gen S21-class miner (728,258 kWh/BTC, July 2026 difficulty). Sorted cleanest grid first. ~ = lower-confidence value.

ProvinceGrid intensity
gCO₂eq/kWh		Dominant sourceCO₂ / BTC (S21)
tonnes		CO₂ / BTC (S19)
tonnes
Quebec QC1.2Hydro ~94%0.91.7
Manitoba MB1.3Hydro ~97%1.01.9
British Columbia BC14.0Hydro ~87-90% (incl. Site C)10.220.1
Newfoundland & Labrador NL17.0Hydro ~95% + Holyrood oil backup12.424.4
Ontario ON60.0Nuclear ~51% + hydro ~24% + gas ~16%43.785.9
Prince Edward Island PE265.0~Imports ~69% from NB grid (on-island generation ~99% wind)193.0379.5
New Brunswick NB330.0Nuclear ~40% + hydro ~23% + fossil240.3472.6
Alberta AB335.0Natural gas ~70%+ (post-coal) + wind/solar244.0479.8
Saskatchewan SK630.0Coal ~41% + gas ~44% + hydro ~14%458.8902.3
Nova Scotia NS660.0Coal/petcoke ~50% + gas + wind + imported hydro480.7945.3
Method & honest caveats. kg CO₂/BTC = grid intensity × kWh-to-mine-1-BTC ÷ 1000. The kWh/BTC is single-sourced live from our Cost to Mine 1 Bitcoin model (hashrate cancels, so it is network-wide). Three honest limits: (1) these use average grid intensity — a new mining load can draw marginal power (often gas-fired), which may be higher; (2) generation intensity differs from grid-supplied/consumption intensity where a province imports or exports a lot; (3) figures are operational (combustion) — hydro, nuclear and wind carry small non-zero lifecycle emissions. Grid intensity: ECCC National Inventory Report + Canada Energy Regulator. See also the electricity rates and US-state mining datasets.

This is why keeping cheap, clean hydro power at home is a sovereignty question, not just an economic one: pricing miners and AI compute out of Quebec doesn’t make that power cleaner — it exports the advantage to grids that are far dirtier. The electricity side of the same math is the cost to mine 1 bitcoin (same kWh-per-BTC model, priced in dollars); the rate detail is the electricity rates by province dataset; and the business-climate view of where mining goes is the US-state mining comparison.

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Last reviewed July 17, 2026.