A Vitalik Buterin-themed NFT collection, known as Buterin Cards, briefly became the leading consumer of gas on the Ethereum blockchain on Friday, causing a momentary spike in Gwei.
As of 3:00 p.m. ET, the Buterin Cards project had utilized 13.1% of the total gas units over the preceding three hours, surpassing the Uniswap universal router address and Tether’s public address, according to data from the Ethereum blockchain explorer Etherscan. The project generated transaction fees amounting to 318.31 ETH, equivalent to $665,670, within the last 24 hours.
Following the spike, gas usage subsided, falling back below Uniswap in consumption.
The Buterin Cards initiative aims to release 2,015 NFTs paying tribute to Vitalik Buterin, the co-founder of the Ethereum blockchain. The project employs a unique NFT minting process called JPEG mining, where image data is stored on-chain, as opposed to traditional NFTs that only store metadata on-chain.
The project’s website explains, “To prevent miners from uploading arbitrary data, the smart contract verifies the data’s correctness by computing its hash. Thanks to progressive JPEG technology, the NFT image is gradually revealed as it is mined.”
“In return for their work, miners receive a card featuring an image of Vitalik Buterin at varying quality levels,” it adds.
