Do Bitcoin miners care about renewable energy?

[Adam4Eve]

Honest question:

If you are mining Bitcoin (or any other cryptocurrency), do you ever consider the source of the energy?

Example:

Coal at 2 cents.

Hydro at 4 cents.

What would you do? Would you even consider where the power comes from, or simply go after the cheapest rates?

[1713898494]

1713898494

[sarcheer]

Personally, my set up is too small and is located within the server room of my existing business which is in an office building. So unfortunately, I do not have the option to deploy my own solar. In addition, the relatively small size and colocated nature of my mine does not give me any option other than the local power company.

If I had the choice you presented, I would have to calculate which would be most advantageous tax-wise. Electricity costs are deductible so depending on how much gear I plan on purchasing this year I would look at projected electricity costs to make sure I minimize my tax burden. If its even remotely close in terms of final costs, I would choose the hydro/green power.

[philipma1957]

this is easy question> I am a life long asthmatic sufferer.

I live in New Jersey,USA

Once you look at this map of pollution from coal using electrical plants. Making solar builds is an easy choice.

[maydna]

Making solar builds is an easy choice...

Yes, making a solar panel will be a great choice, but unfortunately, the price is too high. I already ask in my city, and I got the answer from that guy who can install the solar panel.

He says that I need to buy the hardware for installation for about $2000-$2500, but I forgot how much Kwh that I get. Maybe if the price is not too high for me, I will try to install a solar panel because it can reduce my electricity fee and I can use my rig again to mining the coin.

Later, I will try to search for the other store that can install the solar panel, or maybe I will search by online because in a few months ago, I see an advertisement about solar panel.

[fanatic26_]

Well for one, coal cant get that cheap without some special government subsidies. It simply costs too much to mine and transport to be that cheap.

That being said, my company only buys renewable hydro energy, and would never mess with dirty coal. There is enough environmental damage to the earth without us adding to it.

[Steamtyme]

It's interesting that people have a choice. It's not something I grew up with or have now, all our electricity comes from hydro. I'm not really sure what the other provinces have in place, at most I know some can choose between the provider.

So for your example given the choices, I would go with the 4 cent power. This would only last until I was nearly priced out of mining, I'm willing to do my share but you still have to keep your head above water. I would expect any business facing this option would go with the less expensive power cost; unless they were particularly pro environment.

Ideally though if this is the situation they would find some other way to offset their carbon footprint overall, even if it meant using "dirty" power. Maybe even find a way to produce their own renewable infrastructure. This is unfortunately not a route many long term businesses want to try or take seriously. Hopefully Phil starts a movement warehouse owners.

That being said, my company only buys renewable hydro energy, and would never mess with dirty coal. There is enough environmental damage to the earth without us adding to it.

It's nice when you are around it and it's plentiful. Just wondering you don't have a less expensive option available do you?

[fanatic26_]

It's nice when you are around it and it's plentiful. Just wondering you don't have a less expensive option available do you?

We purchase our power on the open market, we can buy it from whoever we want. We are not contracted to some power company as most power companies buy and resell power themselves and do not produce the majority of what they sell.

Again, there is no dirty energy that is cheaper to produce then the proper renewable energies.

Geothermal/hydro - build facility and run it

coal - build facility, secure a mine, mine the coal, transport the coal, process the coal, use the coal

It simply costs more to make dirty energy. There is another large mining operation in Montana that does use coal power. They pay significantly more than we do for power and there are new environmental laws that might be shutting those coal setups down permanently in the next few years and that will end their business.

[philipma1957]

Good.  A lot of people simply don't get it.  The play is use mining to grew renewable  clean energy.

NJ, USA has good solar incentives buysolar and I hope to continue expanding solar builds using mining to help us do it.

That player in Montana with a big farm would do well to figure a way to create more renewable clean power and not dirty fuel plants.  but that is like a logger clear cutting vs proper forest management. or a fisherman fishing till the fish are fished out.

There will always be a short term guy doing it the so called cheap and easy way.

If coal and oil plants were forced to pay for the true amount of pollution they cause (not global warming) just particulates they drop on the world from burning fuel it would not be that cheap.

[fanatic26_]

I would be fine with a complete ban on dirty energy sources powering commercial mining projects. Even our company is lumped in with the guys using coal here, even though we have nothing to do with it. Apparently just being in the same industry makes us the bad guys to the ignorant people that run the local governments out here. I have managed 5 hydro powered datacenters at this point myself and see no reason why anyone should be using coal to power their miners.

Not to bring politics into this but thank the stars Trumps push for coal died so quickly, we need to get away from it as soon as possible.

[philipma1957]

I would be fine with a complete ban on dirty energy sources powering commercial mining projects. Even our company is lumped in with the guys using coal here, even though we have nothing to do with it. Apparently just being in the same industry makes us the bad guys to the ignorant people that run the local governments out here. I have managed 5 hydro powered datacenters at this point myself and see no reason why anyone should be using coal to power their miners.

Not to bring politics into this but thank the stars Trumps push for coal died so quickly, we need to get away from it as soon as possible.

   Yeah people don't realize that a coal plant with modern scrubbing technology has a major issue how to store the used scrubbing filters.  They are highly toxic and can do serious damage  to drinking water if disposed of in underground dumps.

Or unscrubbed coal plant discharge  which simply drops mercury all along the path of the discharge path for 100's of miles.

I am not going to touch the global warming issues and claims.

But the mercury discharge is factual and mercury in food and water = bad

[sidehack]

Not to mention lead, uranium, arsenic...

[mikeywith]

I think a lot of people would go for the cheaper source, despite what they say, it's human nature that people always want more profit for less cost, if not for regulation and restriction then majority of people with go with whatever cheaper option they have.

where i live the only power sources are natural gas and oil, and they are so cheap that nobody would even think about solar or anything else for that matter.

i want nothing more than a clean world, but i can't really convince the demon inside me to pay a fortune for solar panels when i have almost free power rate.

[philipma1957]

I think a lot of people would go for the cheaper source, despite what they say, it's human nature that people always want more profit for less cost, if not for regulation and restriction then majority of people with go with whatever cheaper option they have.

where i live the only power sources are natural gas and oil, and they are so cheap that nobody would even think about solar or anything else for that matter.

i want nothing more than a clean world, but i can't really convince the demon inside me to pay a fortune for solar panels when i have almost free power rate.

I understand why you do it.  you want to mine  you can get a deal on dirty power.

and you don't get an asthma attack ten minutes after you fire up the miners.

Hey I smoked cigarettes from 13 to 39  knowing I had asthma and shouldn't smoke them.

Being human we are supposed to be able to reason about the future.  But we often make our decisions in the now and for the now.

As  the lyrics of this song "I want it all and I want it now..."  Queen

[mikeywith]

sadly, we are humans, actually some people think the whole mining thing is bad for mother earth , and they sound reasonable to be honest, we burn a tremendous amount of resources just to run a "virtual" coin which most people treat as a lottery ticket.

[philipma1957]

sadly, we are humans, actually some people think the whole mining thing is bad for mother earth , and they sound reasonable to be honest, we burn a tremendous amount of resources just to run a "virtual" coin which most people treat as a lottery ticket.

but if you use the mining to develop renewable power and  make solar power plants as the goal then mining = good.

it can be done. buysolar and I do this.

USA ,NJ it not the only place where laws work for this idea.

[Indamuck]

Tragedy of the commons, very few people will do something for the greater good.  Game theory tells us that humans will act selfishly and do whatever fills their pockets.  Of course there are some good apples out there but capitalism is dominated by a ruthless obsession for increasing the bottom line.

[philipma1957]

Tragedy of the commons, very few people will do something for the greater good.  Game theory tells us that humans will act selfishly and do whatever fills their pockets.  Of course there are some good apples out there but capitalism is dominated by a ruthless obsession for increasing the bottom line.

Absolutely no hating just what we as people are prone to do.

I am 62  world population is now about 8 billion when I was a kid it was under 3 billion.

Common sense would say don't have a lot of kids 1 or 2 max.  Yet world wide many people have 3 or more.

it is what people do  and it encourages a Thanos type solution

[OgNasty]

I care.

[sidehack]

People are, on average, having fewer kids now than they used to. It's just now most of them survive to adulthood instead of three fourths of them dying off due to malnutrition, accidents or preventable diseases.

Though now one of the main killers of children globally is manmade pollution, mostly from toxic air and drinking water.

Fortunately short-term profit, not survivability, is the only metric for success in America so we'll just keep cashin' in no matter who we gotta screw over. Why else would we elect a billionaire crook to President, and then let him put a petroleum lawyer in charge of environmental protection, and a petroleum CEO in charge of foreign affairs, and a coal man in charge of national parks? Certainly not for any kind of long-term maintenance and prosperity.

Half the reason I'm shutting down my hosting this year is because I can no longer justify the operation running entirely off coal power. Maybe I'll put it back together in a few years if I can get a decent renewables infrastructure set up, but not before then.

[minefarmbuy]

Yea, I've been collecting solar quotes for my home. Oregon has some good incentives for set up for consumer and businesses. I wouldn't put faith on any administration to do what's right for people/planet. You're responsible for your own footprint.