The short answer is about 725,000 homes. But this assumes that consumption is steady, without peaks in the day time or during air conditioning season. If you account for uneven use and especially for distribution loss, a more realistic answer is probably around 300,000 homes. Let’s look at the assumptions and calculation… Let me extrapolate from my own electric bill. I have a 7 room home with 3 family members, 3 bedrooms, many computers, TVs, and a fully finished, brightly lit basement. We heat our home and hot water with gas, but we use an electric washer and dryer and our biggest consumption is very likely our big electric oven and stove. We almost always have heating elements burning in the many coffee makers, rice cooker, waffle maker, toaster oven, etc. My daughter uses a 1600W hot air blow dryer every day. The garage has an electric door and electric stoves washer and dryer. We do not have central air, but we have four window air conditioners ranging from 5,000 to 12,000 BTU. During July and August, we often use 3 units at the same time. The air conditioning increases our electric consumption by about 50%. On the other hand, we practice conservation religiously and and have swapped in ultra efficient LED lighting, refrigerator and TVs. We use motion detectors to ensure that lights are shut off when we leave rooms. With all of this conservation (and with gas heating), we consume between 400 and 750 kWh each month (425 in our most recent month — March — which doesn’t require air conditioning). Based on discussions with neighbors (especially, those with more than 3 residents or those that entertain more frequently), I have learned that their bills are 40~75% higher than mine. So, I am betting that a typical home with non-electric heating uses about 1,000 kWh per month.Update—added after this answer was published: It appears that my guesstimate is close to factual. The US Energy Information Administration says that in 2014, average US home electrical consumption was 911 kWh per month.There are about 725 hours in a month, which means that a typical home burns, on average, about (1000 ÷ 725) = 1.38 KWH on average. A gigawatt is a billion watts. Based on the above assumptions, a gigawatt power generator (if attached to a constant load without peaks), should power about 725,000 homes. Incidentally, 1 Gigawatt is more power than produced by conventional power plants. 44% of power in the USA comes from coal. A typical coal powered plant produces 547 MW of power at full capacity. Nuclear power accounts for 34% of US power production. The output of nuclear plants in America range from 500MW to 4 GW. The Palo Verde nuclear power plant in Arizona is the largest with three reactors and a total capacity of just under 4 GW.

For instance, at the end of 2021, there were over 228 GW of solar photovoltaic (PV) and wind power in the United States combined.

For instance, at the end of 2021, there were over 228 GW of solar photovoltaic (PV) and wind power in the United States combined

3.125 Million Photovoltaic (PV) Panels

333 Utility-Scale Wind Turbines

100 Million LEDs

Roughly 1.3 Million Horses

2,000 Corvette Z06s

9,090 Nissan Leafs

1.21 GW would be the entire peak output of one of the largest power plants in the United States (nuclear or coal). 1.21 GW would be the output of 25 General Electric LM6000 aeroderivative jet engine generators. 1.21 GW would be the output of about 3600 Chevrolet Corvette LT1 6.2l V8 engines.

My air conditioner at home uses about 5000 watts, when it is running. 1.21 GW will power 1.21 x 10^^9 /5000 = 242,000 of those houses.

To get a sense of how much that is, an average American household uses 10,812 kWh of power in a year. Consuming energy at a rate of 1.21 GW uses the same amount of energy in about 30 seconds.

First of all, gigawatts is not a measure of energy, but of power. Power is energy per second. If energy is like distance, power is like speed. It’s a rate of energy transfer, not a measure of energy itself. One way to imagine how much power that is, is that 1.21 GW is about a million microwave ovens running at once.

It is not a measure of an amount of energy. Watts are a measure of the rate of energy usage. One point 21 gigawatts is the rate of a 1.21 billion Joules of energy used in one second. About $98,000 dollars per second.

My Tesla’s EPA rating is 26 kWh per 100 miles. So 1 MWh would take you 3,846 miles. PET HATE:A watt (or a kilowatt or a megawatt) is a measure of how fast electricity is flowing.If you’re talking about an actual amount of energy then you have to talk about watt-hours (Wh) or (kWh or MWh).26 kW would be a rate of energy consumption or flow…the “power” of the system. 26 kWh would be the amount of electricity a 26kW system would deliver in an hour or which a 1 kW system would produce over 26 hours - which is the energy capacity.

Let’s do math. Figures used are relevant for now, 30/11/2017, around 8PM GMT. Current hashrate for BTC : 8,049,500,099 GH/s (was up to 10,400,000,000 GH/s last month) Block generation time : 12.1 minutes Bitcoin reward by block : 12.5 Most of mining ASICs are Antminer S9, consuming 1323W/h for 13.5TH/s So, to generate 1 BTC, we need 8,049,500/13.5 = 596,259 S9 running for 12.5 blocks / 12.1 min = 58.08 sec. So the consumption of energy is 596,259 S9 x 1323 W/h x (58.08sec/3600sec) = 12 726 790W, or 12,727kWh. However, the power efficiency of an Antminer S9 and its PSU is around 93%, so it’s 12,727/0.93=13.684kWh If I didn’t make a mistake, you need 13,684kWh to mine one single BTC just now. sources: BTC infos: Bitcoin Difficulty and Hashrate Chart