How much does it cost YOU to produce a bitcoin?

[nazgulnarsil]

me: $3.11.  At a price of $15 mining stays profitable for me until a difficulty of 7.5 Million

my electricity rate .125/kwh

I know some people out there pay half that.

[Miner99er]

Card, MHash, Mothly BTC Production(and in USD), Cost to run per month

HD4850, 68, 1.33 ($19.95), $6.78
HD5830, 300, 5.87 ($88.03), $11.23
HD6950, 340, 6.65 ($99.77), $8.99

I'll be profitable for some time...

[Yannick]

HD5870x2, 844, 15 ($225), $0.00 thanks to solar panels even at night.

[Salain]

Power consumption and 2 year linear depreciation on cards, $8.92 / BTC

[Transisto]

Power consumption and 2 year linear depreciation on cards, $8.92 / BTC

what % will be worth your card in 2 years ?  Zero ?

[imperi]

About 30 minutes at my job. (after tax)

[nazgulnarsil]

HD5870x2, 844, 15 ($225), $0.00 thanks to solar panels even at night.

NOOOOOOOOO! 
You solar panel people are going to drive the rest of us out of business.

[Salain]

Power consumption and 2 year linear depreciation on cards, $8.92 / BTC

what % will be worth your card in 2 years ?  Zero ?

Yes, that is the assumption.  Actually I do a quick depreciation to %65, then linear depreciate to 0%.  

I do consider 2 years to be conservative, but not without a realistic basis.  If a card craps out at month 16, my depreciation cost estimate would instantly become 33% too low.  Also I'm unsure how far factors such as ASIC development and a flood of GPUs into the market following a confidence crash could lower GPU prices.

[AngelusWebDesign]

HD5870x2, 844, 15 ($225), $0.00 thanks to solar panels even at night.

NOOOOOOOOO! 
You solar panel people are going to drive the rest of us out of business.

Those things are not cheap. They cost multiples of $10,000 to install, even for a modest system.

So it's not "lucky you -- you get $50 in free bitcoins every month" but rather "lucky you, you could afford a $25,000 solar panel system".

What I'm saying is -- the free bitcoins is the LEAST of that person's good fortune.

Just like those who got into BTC mining in January 2011 (or earlier!) are better off, likewise those who got into the game of LIFE earlier have an advantage.
Every year, inflation eats everyone alive. Those who got "established" in the early 80's, for example, will have paid less for everything, even relative to their lower wages at the time.
Everything's more expensive, and "harder" now, since our dollar has lost more of its value than it had lost in, say, 1985.

Those people got to buy their houses when real estate was much cheaper, for example.

Plus the longer you've been working the more disposable income you tend to have, all things being equal. That is, comparing the same kind of person at 20 vs. 50 years old.

[DullJack]

I live in a predominately college town so this may not apply everywhere.
A lot of landlords here offer some or all utilities included in rent as an incentive to the college kids. Being an apartment dweller at the end of my lease this summer, I specifically found an affordable place I could rent with utilities included. My landlord pays my electricity for me, therefore my he pays my rent for me! He can't be making any money off me, I imagine the power bill is pretty ridiculous with the AC and Bitcoin rigs running all day. Fortunately he can't do anything about it until my lease expires in 12 months.

If you have a big mining farm that eats up a few hundred dollars/month in electricity, it may be worth finding a cheap, electricity-included apartment just to house your rigs. Of course if you are spending that much per month in electricity, I imagine you've probably already considered this option as well as a hundred others. Just be prepared to get tossed out on your ass as soon as your lease expires.

[AngelusWebDesign]

Don't be surprised if the circuit breakers get "tripped" once in a while, and you have to go restart all your miners a few times a week -- or a few times a day.

"Oh, those power surges are a real pain!" he'd say.

I'm sure the landlord wouldn't just take it laying down.

[DullJack]

I'm sure the landlord wouldn't just take it laying down.

You're right, you will probably be getting angry calls from him every other day if you are pulling any real amount of current but there still isn't anything he can legally do about it, depending on your specific lease and any loopholes included I suppose. If you are running a farm out of your apartment, he could probably get the fire marshal to come by but as long as your setup isn't unsafe, they can't really do anything either. No law against having computers.

If he does resort to those sort of "guerrilla tactics" like flipping breakers or otherwise interrupting services to your place, you can try to get evidence of him tampering with your power and have a pretty easy to win lawsuit against him. I personally live in a duplex though so the landlord can't get to my breaker-box without me letting him in.

Just throwing the idea out there since it has been working great for me so far.

[skull88]

HD5870x2, 844, 15 ($225), $0.00 thanks to solar panels even at night.

NOOOOOOOOO! 
You solar panel people are going to drive the rest of us out of business.

And how much do you think he needs to mine to pay off that solar panels  
Thought about solar panels too (not particularly for mining, just for the house), but if I count everything, the panels and the maintenance. I actually get a lot of years electricity for that and when they are paid off I probably almost need to replace them.
I wait a little longer before getting solar panels  

[AngelusWebDesign]

When you start talking about legal recourse, you should keep in mind that the average renter doesn't have deep pockets -- no offense to renters.

If renters had the resources to win a lawsuit, they probably would just BUY a house, or at least get a mortgage on a house of their own.

As they say nowadays -- "Jus' sayin!"

[Zoomer]

If it's a larger complex where many many units share the same meter, it probably won't look too out of place.

[SgtSpike]

About $2.77/BTC.

[bcpokey]

I live in a predominately college town so this may not apply everywhere.
A lot of landlords here offer some or all utilities included in rent as an incentive to the college kids. Being an apartment dweller at the end of my lease this summer, I specifically found an affordable place I could rent with utilities included. My landlord pays my electricity for me, therefore my he pays my rent for me! He can't be making any money off me, I imagine the power bill is pretty ridiculous with the AC and Bitcoin rigs running all day. Fortunately he can't do anything about it until my lease expires in 12 months.

If you have a big mining farm that eats up a few hundred dollars/month in electricity, it may be worth finding a cheap, electricity-included apartment just to house your rigs. Of course if you are spending that much per month in electricity, I imagine you've probably already considered this option as well as a hundred others. Just be prepared to get tossed out on your ass as soon as your lease expires.

amusing, albeit highly unethical. I personally don't think I would ever go this route, though I can understand it. I suppose that's the real free market for you.

Anyway for the OP, where I live probably has some of the highest rates in the nation. It costs me roughly $6.67 to produce a bitcoin based on my last bills and calculating forward my current rate of generation. It will likely become unprofitable for me to mine at around 3million difficulty. Fortunately that will only occur when another ~11THash of computing power comes online, which I suspect will not be for a long while, unless someone busts out some crazy ASIC cluster, which will rape everyone anyway.

EDIT: Not to be too complainy though, where I live it is currently 57F outside, in mid july, that's pretty darn good for a big fat bitcoin farm. No AC for me

[AngelusWebDesign]

Where do you live, Alaska?

[nazgulnarsil]

counting solar panel cost as a cost of production is silly.  the marginal cost of using the electricity for BTC is zero assuming he is generating a surplus.  counting the costs of the solar panels would only make sense if he installed them specifically for mining or mining made them more expensive somehow.

[NetTecture]

counting solar panel cost as a cost of production is silly.  the marginal cost of using the electricity for BTC is zero assuming he is generating a surplus.  counting the costs of the solar panels would only make sense if he installed them specifically for mining or mining made them more expensive somehow.

No, ignoring the opportunit cost is ignorant. Stupid.

Put 25.000 USD into a bank account and you get money. Sell the electricity and you get money. Use it for mining and you loose that - this is a cost. It is  called opportunity cost. Same with depreciation - yes, aldo solar cells dont live forever.

The cost of capital and loss of other income sources is a cost. For example every hour I spend tending my farm is a cost of 100 USD (actually more) because I loose an hour I can invoice a customer for.