At a first glance, it seems quite expensive, but analyzing the method carefully it could be even more convenient than mining because electricity costs are much lower.
And it's much less obvious to neighours, or your electricity provider, that something unusual is going on.
And hey, home mining in China may just become much more usual anyway if super draconian measures against cryptocurrencies ensue, the Chinese state (or any state for that matter) is only ever really effective at "cutting the heads of flowers that grow too tall". 100's of millions of people in China mining (or using other resources to obtain Bitcoin) are going to be impossible to stamp out effectively, yet again without turning China into a wholesale facsimile of the North Korean state. PRC could kiss their world economic standing goodbye if so.
And if mining were banned, I expect the Chinese market (and those of surrounding states) will be flooded with mining units from the large mines that are shut down, and they'll be sold pretty cheap in order to get the sale done quicker.
And in addition, mining ASICs will still likely be manufactured in China, the Chinese government is only too happy, upto now, to allow very loose control over electronics manufacturing, as they're all too aware that the state is profiting from the copying of copyrighted electronics for years now. It's going to be incredibly difficult for the Chinese state to put the Bitcoin genie back in the bottle, and of course, this was Satoshi's intention when he developed Bitcoin's design.
