Ethereum is currently the world’s most popular blockchain platform, hosting tens of thousands of applications and over $40 billion in value. With hundreds of millions of users, it’s at an inflection point. Vitalik Buterin, the co-founder of Ethereum, has proposed one pretty dramatic change. He is looking to replace the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) with RISC-V, a low-level, open-source instruction set architecture. This proposal has been oriented towards improving performance, particularly in the case of producing zero-knowledge proofs. It does invite questions about its security, compatibility, and what disruption such change might bring to the Ethereum ecosystem. When the transition does go ahead, it will be a 10-year process at least. This transformation will have implications across the entire ecosystem, from the base layer to Layer-2s.

Further, the current EVM has accrued a decade of security experience. This is what makes it one of the most reliable and trusted elements in the blockchain world. Replacing it completely would require rebuilding a completely new network from the ground up, which could leave the entire network vulnerable to unforeseen vulnerabilities. The shift requires intentional focus on potential compatibility concerns. This is especially pressing as it concerns Layer-2 (L2) scaling solutions that are being developed on top of Ethereum.

The Promise of RISC-V

In Buterin’s view, a RISC-V-based virtual machine would make huge inroads into improving the speed of producing zero-knowledge proofs. He projects that improvement might be as much as 100-fold faster. Zero-knowledge proofs are an incredible cryptographic primitive. They allow one side to prove to the other that a given statement is accurate without necessarily having to disclose any underlying data. They are absolutely critical to privacy and scaling solutions on Ethereum.

"ZK-STARK and ZK-SNARK rollups could reduce proving times and costs," - Block.nm

RISC-V’s open-source nature and simpler instruction set might help write provable programs. This is a massive benefit when compared with the EVM, notoriously complicated and riddled with oddities in the implementation of its code.

"With register-based execution, it's easier to write provable programs." - Block.nm

As proof, RISC-V is showing up under the hood in projects such as Nervos, proving its potential to be a foundational component of blockchain infrastructure. Applying it to Ethereum, with its huge ecosystem and network effects, is a different set of challenges.

Security and Disruption Concerns

Restoration of security One of the biggest concerns surrounding the replacement of the EVM has been that EVMs are not hackable. Stuart Popejoy, co-founder and CEO of Kadena, Tokendesk’s predecessor, also has a foreboding warning. He emphasizes the huge upheaval that any of these changes would entail.

"We'd reset 10 years of accumulated security knowledge to zero," - Popejoy

The current EVM has been extensively battle-tested over many years, including multiple audits that resulted in bug fixes. Replacing it would throw all of that institutional knowledge with it, and in some cases maybe even replacing it adds new vulnerabilities. Not only that, the transition would be a herculean task in and of itself to keep current smart contracts and applications operating as intended in the new landscape.

"Existing state is cryptographically tied to specific addresses on the EVM." - Popejoy

Popejoy focused on the challenges in migrating legacy state and making everything work across the network. Support for dual-VMs for at least a 10-year period is a real-world possibility. This detailed approach will allow for a thoughtful, measured transition.

"There's no future in which there's a large short-term disruption because it couldn't possibly happen fast," - Popejoy

Navigating the Transition

A significant portion of the Ethereum community is proactive in its efforts to prepare for the risks present by a hypothetical replacement for the EVM. One proposed solution, EIP-7983, suggests capping gas usage per transaction, which could help to limit the impact of any unforeseen vulnerabilities. This proposal is still subject to ongoing discussion and may not go nearly far enough to remedy each of these concerns.

Compatibility issues don’t stop with Ethereum’s Layer-2 scaling solutions. Transitioning to EVM solutions These products all depend on the EVM for executing transactions and for bridging back to the main chain. If the EVM gets replaced, L2s will either need to make significant adaptations or be entirely rebuilt. As you can imagine this process is both time-intensive and expensive.

Buterin has been open to acknowledging these challenges. He posits that if cross-L2-RISC-V compatibility is found to be impossible, then sovereignty may become a requirement for L2s. This would mean that L2s would operate independently of the main Ethereum chain, which could have implications for interoperability and network effects.