Cambridge Center Assesses Ethereum's Energy Consumption Post-Merge

Ethereum consumes approximately 7.87 GWh of electricity annually, a staggering 99.96% reduction from its pre-Merge levels. This conclusion comes from the Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance (CCAF) in an updated study on the network's environmental impact.

Energy consumption and carbon footprint of Ethereum after transitioning to Proof-of-Stake. Source: CCAF.

On September 15, 2022, Ethereum transitioned from Proof-of-Work (PoW) to Proof-of-Stake (PoS). Before the upgrade, its continuous power consumption was around 2.4 GW, which is now estimated at about 0.90 MW.

According to the report's authors, under PoW, electricity was a direct cost of network security. After moving to PoS, it became an operational expense for nodes, with blockchain security now relying on staked capital.

How Energy Consumption Was Calculated

CCAF employed a bottom-up approach. Researchers measured actual electricity consumption at the outlet for 20 combinations of Ethereum client software and hardware configurations.

A home setup consumed about 18 watts, while a professional workstation used around 150 watts. Given that 36% of nodes operated on home connections and 64% were on cloud or corporate infrastructure, the average consumption was approximately 105 watts per node.

The calculation was based on around 8,522 detectable full nodes. The authors noted this figure as a lower bound rather than an exact total, as the monitoring system did not capture closed setups, nodes behind firewalls restricting incoming connections, and configurations with detection turned off.

The baseline scenario yields 7.87 GWh per year, with lower and upper bounds of 1.26 GWh and 11.49 GWh, respectively. These were calculated for scenarios where all nodes operated solely on home devices or exclusively on professional workstations.

Majority of Nodes Hosted by Providers

As of May 2026, the U.S. accounted for 31% of detectable full nodes, Germany for 16%, Finland for 8%, and France for 6%. Together, these countries hosted about 62% of the infrastructure.

The largest hosting providers, Hetzner, AWS, and OVH, managed around 40% of the nodes. The authors expressed concern that reliance on a few operators poses a risk of simultaneous outages affecting a significant portion of the infrastructure.

64% of detectable Ethereum nodes are hosted on cloud or corporate infrastructure. Source: CCAF, MigaLabs.

Ethereum Compared to Other PoS Networks

In terms of absolute energy consumption, Ethereum ranked second among the sample, following Solana. According to data from CCAF and the Crypto Carbon Ratings Institute, Solana consumes about 13.48 GWh annually.

When normalized for market capitalization, Ethereum used approximately 33 kWh for every $1 million in network value, with only BNB Chain reporting a lower figure.

Solana's consumption was 283 kWh per $1 million, roughly 8.5 times higher. The total consumption of the PoS networks studied was estimated at around 38 GWh per year.

Energy consumption of major Proof-of-Stake networks in absolute terms and adjusted for market capitalization. Source: CCRI, CCAF, Coin Metrics.

The metric per $1 million in capitalization depends on token market value and fluctuates with their price. It does not reflect network throughput and does not indicate energy use per transaction.

The report's authors dismissed the "energy per transaction" metric. They estimated that about 92% of transactions in the Ethereum ecosystem occur on scaling networks rather than the mainnet, making calculations based solely on mainnet transactions misleading.

Carbon Footprint Reduced by 99.98%

Renewable and nuclear sources accounted for 56.4% of the electricity powering Ethereum nodes, while fossil fuels made up 43.6%. CCAF estimated the annual carbon footprint of the network at approximately 2,370 tons of CO₂ equivalent, a 99.98% decrease from the last figure before the Merge.

Electricity source structure for Ethereum nodes and carbon footprint scenarios. Source: CCAF, NREL.

Researchers believe that further reductions in emissions will primarily depend on the decarbonization of energy systems in the countries hosting the nodes. Even with stable energy consumption, the network's carbon footprint could decrease as the share of low-carbon generation increases.

A few days after the Merge, Glassnode analysts recorded a 92.8% reduction in Ethereum issuance. Nearly a month later, ForkLog explored the nuances and significance of the recent upgrade, debunking popular myths surrounding it.

In July 2026, Vitalik Buterin identified quantum resistance, privacy, scalability, and restructuring key protocol elements as the main priorities for Ethereum's new roadmap.