James Stafford, editor of Oilprice.com not only does the math, but explains the energy-driven geographic arbitrage currently driving bitcoin mining. 

The bitcoin boom is well and truly underway, and investors are constantly looking for new ways to gain an advantage in this space The best way to do this, it seems, is by cutting the energy costs of mining this precious commodity. The bitcoin mining industry consumes 22.5 TWh of energy annually, which amounts to 13,239,916 barrels of oil equivalent.

With 12.5 bitcoins being mined every 10 minutes, that means the average energy cost of one bitcoin would equate to 20 barrels of oil equivalent.

While it's all about where you sit on the cost curve, Stafford provides us with some context on gross energy consumption.

To put this in perspective, the total energy consumption of the world's Bitcoin mining activities is more than 40 times greater than that required to power the entire Visa network.

And it's very profitable...