Why Solana's energy number changed, and why that's good news
If you’ve ever defended blockchain in a dinner-table argument, you’ve probably quoted it: a Solana transaction uses 0.00412 Wh, less energy than a Google search. It’s on slides, in threads, in articles. It’s also two years out of date.
The current figure, from the Solana Climate Dashboard, is 0.00878 Wh per transaction (as of 27 August 2026). Roughly double the number everyone still quotes.
So did Solana get dirtier? No. The measurement got better.
What actually changed
Solana’s energy accounting is done independently by the Crypto Carbon Ratings Institute (CCRI), which physically measures validator hardware in a lab in Munich, models the marginal cost of throughput, and applies a geographically weighted carbon-intensity profile based on where validators actually run.
Since the September 2024 report, CCRI has revised how it models the network and allocates energy between transactions and holdings, so the old and new figures aren’t directly comparable. The network also changed: validator counts, hardware generations, and transaction volumes all moved.
The result is a bigger per-transaction number that describes reality more honestly.
The numbers that matter, dated and sourced
As of 2026-08-27, via Carbonara/CCRI:
- 0.00878 Wh of electricity per transaction
- 0.00278 g CO₂e emitted per transaction
- 7.08 GWh annualized network electricity, about what 650 to 700 US homes use in a year
- 2,264 tonnes CO₂e annualized network footprint
Why we’re publishing the bigger number
Because the alternative is worse. A community that quotes a stale, flattering figure eventually gets corrected in public, and loses the argument it should have won. The honest number is still an extraordinary story: a global settlement layer processing billions of transactions on the energy budget of a small town.
Under the EU’s MiCA regulation, sustainability indicators for crypto assets are now a disclosure requirement, not a marketing choice. Solana’s dashboard already publishes them. The ecosystem should get used to leading with measured numbers. They’re good enough to stand on their own.
Figures update daily at climate.solana.com. We date every number we publish, and update this page when the data moves.
Corrected 23 October 2026. We changed the household comparison (7.08 GWh is roughly 650 to 700 US homes, not “a few thousand”), removed a comparison with transatlantic flights and one with legacy payments that we couldn’t source, and softened our explanation of CCRI’s methodology change, which we couldn’t confirm in detail. Since this was written, Solana has also activated the Alpenglow upgrade, which changes how transactions are counted. The current figures are on the sustainability page.