Most Eco-Friendly Cryptocurrency to Buy in 2024: Invest in Green Blockchain

What is the most eco-friendly cryptocurrency? Despite being criticized for their environmental impact, many cryptocurrencies are sustainable.

However, if you want to invest in environmentally friendly cryptocurrencies, read our guide for the top options available.

A Closer Look at the Most Eco-Friendly Cryptocurrency List

We examine the most eco-friendly cryptocurrency in light of the climate crisis, which has led some investors to question whether crypto is environmentally harmful.

Keep reading as we discuss the greenest cryptocurrency in 2024.

1. Tezos (XTZ) – Most Environmentally Friendly Cryptocurrency That Ensures Active Community Governance and Participation

Tezos is a blockchain hosting the associated digital token Tez (XTZ). XTZ can be used for spending, holding, baking, or sending. The blockchain ensures active community governance and participation. In fact, users can evaluate, propose, and approve amendments to Tezos. 

Tezos had one of the best ICOs ever. By January 2021, it ranked as the seventh-largest crypto coin offering.

By using languages lOCaml and Michelson, Tezos also provides safety and code correctness for assets and other high-value use cases at the protocol and application layers. 

Its Proof-of-Stake mechanism requires substantially less energy and cost to operate, making it a perfect eco-friendly platform. It is built to stay state-of-the-art, with its formal upgrade mechanism and modular architecture minimizing disruptions and offering enhanced functionality and regular upgradability. 

The use of formal verification makes Tezos smart contracts reliable, secure, and mathematically verified. The platform has made high-profile partnerships and keeps expanding with new collaborations. 

If you are interested in news and activity within the Tezos ecosystem, you can check out its content channel, Spotlight. 

2. Cardano (ADA) – Ecological Crypto, Developed Through Evidence-Based Methods and Founded on Peer-Reviewed Research

Cardano is a decentralized PoS blockchain aiming to be more efficient than PoW blockchains. It was launched by Ethereum’s co-founder Charles Hoskinson in September 2017. 

The blockchain is the first one developed through evidence-based methods and founded on peer-reviewed research. Cardano is secured with a custom-built PoS protocol called Ouroboros. Cardano’s goal is to be a dApp development platform with verifiable smart contracts and a multi-asset ledger. 

The platform is sustainable, flexible, and scalable for running smart contracts, enabling the development of many DeFi apps, games, new crypto tokens, and more. Cardano’s native cryptocurrency, ADA, can be used to send and receive payments, store value, stake, and pay transaction fees on the blockchain. 

The current Cardano price is $0.3943, and its market cap is $14,160,151,707. There’s a total of 37,089,410,846 ADA tokens. Independent entities like the Cardano Foundation, Input Output, EMURGO, PRAGMA, and Intersect work together to enhance the platform and ensure alignment with its core mission. 

This third-generation blockchain can become a dominant smart contract platform, but much of its development is still ahead. 

3. Chia (XCH) – One of the Eco Coins That Focuses on Practical Use Cases

Chia is a crypto platform that uses a proof-of-space mechanism for mining, which is considered more eco-friendly than a proof-of-work mechanism. The platform’s decentralized technology offers data security and an enhanced network to avoid attacks and breaches. Bram Cohen, the creator of BitTorrent, and Ryan Singer founded the Chia Network in 2017. 

Instead of the typical ICO used to launch many cryptos, the Chia Network chose to reserve pre-farmed tokens and raise venture capital. 

Moreover, Chia is regulatory compliant and developed to secure its consumers worldwide, fostering innovation and digital asset adoption. DataLayer is a key feature of the platform, creating a decentralized data store that is resistant to interference and fraud and is perfect for collaborative environments.

Chia merges the security and immutability of a public blockchain with the privacy of existing databases. Users can farm and earn XCH tokens using unused storage space and computer hardware. Chia focuses on practical use cases, improving business workflows, implementing eco-friendly practices, and promoting collaboration and trust in enterprise and government sectors. 

4. Stellar (XLM) – Top ESG Cryptocurrency Offering Cheaper and Faster Cross-Border Payments

Stellar is a decentralized platform for cheaper and faster cross-border payments and one of the best-performing altcoins. It aims to connect payment systems, banks, and people for seamless money transfer, all while maintaining a lower carbon footprint. Stellar’s native cryptocurrency, called the lumen, trades under the symbol XLM. 

Stellar has a ledger that racks ownership of all crypto tokens and accounts on its network. It manages the ledger and processes transactions with its own algorithm, the Stellar Consensus Protocol.

This ecosystem has many projects and partnerships, with two of the most high-profile partnerships being MoneyGram International and IBM. To unlock financial access, Stellar has integrated with Soroban, a Rust-based smart contract platform designed for sensibility and scale. 

The Stellar anchor network supports more than 20 digital assets and more than 180 countries. By including anchor services like cross-border payments, off-ramps, and fiat-backed digital assets, builders can provide new payment services for end users and expand its customer base in new markets globally. 

Between November 2022 and December 2023, Stellar issued more than 255 grants. The network boasts over 81,000 onramp locations globally and has an average ledger closing time of 5.8 seconds. 

5. BitGreen (BITG) – The Green Bitcoin With Philanthropic Initiatives

Bitgreen is a platform built on Polkadot that develops solutions for decentralization and sustainability using blockchain technology. Its custom-built blockchain serves ESG initiatives. In fact, it focuses on renewable energy, philanthropic activities, carbon finance, and impact investing. The team behind Bitgreen has extensive experience in finance, blockchain, and sustainability. 

Bitgreen promotes project finance and provides tools for organizations to realign with energy transitions and environmental regulations. Its goal is to facilitate $1 trillion into sustainability projects in 10 years. 

This is one of the best AI crypto projects, as it uses machine learning and natural language processing to innovate in the tool development that will transform carbon credit markets.

Bitgreen’s primary goals are reduced time to market for project developers, improved quality assurance for purchases, and a greater allocation of benefits for sponsoring conservation communities. 

The platform collaborates with leading organizations like VERRA, Gold Standard, Norton Rose Fulbright, Novogradac, and Deloitte, promoting its reach and credibility in the sustainability sector. 

Bitgreen provides support and educational resources, including a blog, a glossary, an FAQ, and direct contact options. 

6. Ethereum (ETH) — The Most Energy-Efficient Cryptocurrency and the First dApp Ecosystem

If you are looking for eco–friendly crypto projects, consider Ethereum. It is the second-largest digital currency by market cap and the first blockchain for dApp development and smart contracts. Ethereum isn’t only about digital money. Anything users own can be traded, represented, and used as NFTs.

ETH is used as a way to pay validators who stake their coins for their blockchain work, as an investment by speculators, and as an off-chain payment method.

Its shift to Ethereum 2.0 represented a transition from a proof-of-work to a proof-of-stake consensus mechanism, dramatically reducing energy consumption, with the network’s energy usage dropping by an incredible 99.95%. Ethereum’s energy consumption is around 0.0026 TWh/yr across the whole global network.

Almost 50% of the network is located in developed areas that use sustainable energy sources. Of the remaining, around 3% is powered by oil, 10% by coal, and 30% by natural gas. 

Ethereum released the Dencun Upgrade in March 2024. This full upgrade is forecast to allow the platform to scale up to over 100,000 transactions per second and be cheaper, contributing to its greenness. 

7. Hedera Hashgraph (HBAR)— UCL Research’s Most Environmentally-Friendly Crypto

Hedera is a decentralized ledger platform on the blockchain that manages and stores transactions and data. It is an open-source public network directed by leading global organizations. 

Hedera’s EVM smart contracts and native tokenization and consensus services APIs allow developers to create real-life Web3 applications. The platform offers low fees, high throughput with fast finality, a strong codebase, and fair transaction ordering with consensus timestamps. 

Unlike other cryptos, even eco-friendly crypto coins, Hedera isn’t built on top of a conventional blockchain — it uses a distributed ledger technology (DLT) called a Hashgraph. That novel technology improves upon blockchain-based cryptos in areas like scalability, speed, efficiency, and transaction costs.

This is also the best green crypto to invest in. According to the UCL Centre for Blockchain Technologies, Hedera is an energy-efficient cryptocurrency among proof of stake coins with a 0.000003 kWh. To go carbon negative, Hedera frequently purchases green-e climate-certified credits measured in metric tons, which offset all of their network operations.

In collaboration with NoviQTech, Hedera has contributed to the value of more than $850 billion in global carbon markets.

8. Algorand (ALGO)— Partnered With ClimateTrade, an Eco-Friendly Blockchain

Algorand is a single-layer, quantum-secure, and energy-efficient blockchain with consistently high throughput, instant finality, and low fees. The native Algorand’s coin, ALGO, can be used to secure the platform and reward its governors. 

The platform uses the Pure Proof of Stake (PPoS) consensus mechanism that doesn’t include mining at all, which places it on our green crypto list. 

Algorand is the most sustainable cryptocurrency that uses a sustainability oracle to notarize its carbon footprint on-chain for each epoch. Then, to keep its protocol carbon-negative, the Algorand Foundation pledged to lock an equal amount of carbon credit as an ASA (Algorand Standard Asset) into a green treasury.

Algorand has initiated its own projects and provides support to others through its partnership with ClimateTrade. It tokenizes carbon credit assets in Asia, monitors air quality with real-time data, and brings transparency and traceability to carbon markets. One of the projects it supports produces clean energy for 700,000 homes, avoiding 670,000 tons of CO2 emissions annually.

Environmentally-conscious investors who typically invest in Bitcoin may wish to consider Algorand since the network can handle 2,000 TPS, whereas Bitcoin can only facilitate seven.

How to Know Which Crypto Is Eco-Friendly

Most eco-friendly cryptocurrencies are green, consume less energy, and offer financial incentives. They appeal to a wider audience, use innovative technology, and combat crypto stigma. To determine eco-friendly cryptocurrencies, consider:

• the electricity consumption of each blockchain node per year (Cardano performs well);
• the total annual electricity usage across all nodes (Polkadot leads);
• Watt-hour per transaction (Hedera Hashgraph and Solana have the lowest);
• PoS blockchain (IMPT, IBAT, TAMA, and XTZ); and
• Industry partnerships

Many green crypto coins, such as Cardano and Near Protocol, are fighting climate change and deforestation. Others donate to charities like the Red Cross.

What Is Energy Consumption in Blockchain?

Crypto mining is facing an issue of high energy consumption. Bitcoin consumes an estimated 127 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity annually, and CCAF has estimated that Ethereum consumes 6.56 GWh of electricity annually. However, when it comes to low-energy crypto, blockchain networks like Ethereum, Tezos, and Solana, which use PoS consensus protocols, have been found to consume the least energy per year.

Conclusion

In conclusion, these best eco-friendly cryptocurrency projects are worth considering, as the blockchain world is gradually shifting towards eco-friendly alternatives, acknowledging the importance of sustainability.

However, eco-friendly cryptos generate only a little hype and buzz from retail investors, and it can take years for the market to reflect their utility and use cases.

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