Solar powered Bitcoin mining on the Earth Orbit or on the Moon Surface?

[AOL]

This would be beneficial from the perspective of Global Warming on Planet Earth.

But, will it be technically and financially viable?

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[kano]

This would be beneficial from the perspective of Global Warming on Planet Earth.

But, will it be technically and financially viable?

Lotsa stale blocks on the moon ... ... ...

Reddit suggestions are between 2.5 and 12 seconds latency for the moon

A quick google gave me these numbers for satellites, which sound reasonable:

GEO latency is 600 milliseconds
MEO is 180ms
LEO is 40ms

So maybe LEO would be OK ...

As for costs ... gonna cost a fortune to get the rights to put a crap load of miners and solar panels up in orbit ... then you gotta buy the solar panels and miners ... and of course hope they don't crash into anything else up there, or drop into descent and burn up ...

Nah, not happening ...

[OgNasty]

I imagine the amount of resources needed to produce those panels and then get them into space and orbiting safely or installed on the moon would far outweigh any benefits.  Maybe if we had technology to cheaply produce them on the moon it might be within the realm of possibility, but I think if we're targeting wasted energy there is lower hanging fruit than the Bitcoin network, which is already highly dependent on renewable energy.

[NeuroticFish]

But, will it be technically and financially viable?

Neither. It's still way too expensive to get something into the space. And the big latency/ping time will make the "race for getting blocks" unfair (big advantage for those still on Earth).
Maybe a satellite network with mirrors for more solar power (maybe at night too?) could help, but we are still inefficient at harvesting solar energy, the clouds are still real and yes, the operations have to remain on Earth.

[stompix]

Musk was saying Falcon 9 can deliver things into orbit for 2.700 per kilogram, a S19 weighs about 13 so just sending the miner would cost $35k.
Of course, it could be made lighter, but still, it will be heavy, add another 20 kilos for each 250W solar panel lets' assume they will work 24/7 you need 14 of them, so, no it will never be economically feasible.

I don't know how much carbon one space shuttle lunch emits but I have a feeling it will create more Co2 than the whole rig being transported would create running
for a few months on coal-produced energy....

[NotFuzzyWarm]

In addition to ^^ there is the matter of cooling. Ya can't exactly use ambient air pushed by fans as there is no air in space... Heatpipes and large exposed surface areas to act as radiators is how it's currently done but of course they add weight.

[kano]

... so just sending the miner would cost $35k.
...

And of course that's just 1 miner at around 100TH/s ...
As I mentioned, you need "a crap load of miners and solar panels"

[CounterEntropy]

This would be beneficial from the perspective of Global Warming on Planet Earth.

But, will it be technically and financially viable?

Interesting concept. As others have stated above, it is possibly not feasible as of yet. But, in future...

1. When 1 BTC = 1 Million USD or higher, Rocket companies will probably charge in Bitcoin Blocks to place Miner Payloads in the Space/Moon. In fact, for Government backed Mining, Government Space Agencies may charge much less for Government subsidy due to this operation being Environment friendly.

2. If substantial Hash power is parked at the Moon, even 30 second latency might not be much of a downside for 10 minutes block time. If orphaned, Moon miners may still keep building on that chain and eventually outperform Earth miners.

3. When human starts habitat at the Mars, there'll be need of Intergalactic Medium of Exchange. Miners, placed on the Space/Moon, may play a crucial role at that point. Having no/little atmosphere and very low temperature will probably benefit the mining operation.

[willhuber]

So we are literally talking about taking bitcoin to the moon.
As for the environment, it’s a great step forward because we won’t be destroying planet earth and utilizing natural resources to undertake these processes on the moon. Also the day time on the moon is much longer than on the earth. That’s another good news.
But if we talk about viability, I doubt that.

[Artemis3]

Pretty sure we talked about this on this forum, probably the off topic area.

Bitcoin doesn't work for interplanetary purposes, the lag is too much and the blockchain would split. Unless newer communication technologies are discovered, such as with quantum entanglement, something like Earth to Mars won't work.

The moon may work, but i see little use. The dark side of the moon could be used but needs to be powered from the light side. There is a proposal for an astronomy facility powered from the poles, but I'm not sure if by then something like mining bitcoin would be worth it, LEO is far easier and cheaper but the Earth itself is good enough and has plenty of more renewable and currently wasted energy sources.

[turneps]

The idea of ​​using solar power to mine Bitcoin appeared in the world many years ago. When the Bitcoin craze was high in 2017, many ranchers in Australia and the US invested in large solar power systems to mine cryptocurrencies.
Many people still believe that solar energy is not only the cheapest type of energy, but it also helps save grid costs and taxes.
Cryptocurrency mining as well as using solar power to operate miners are still in the "gray zone". Neither the "diggers" nor the "farmers" are sure if their services are protected by law.