Do you live in Venezuela ? I heard they are cracking down on mining there because the power is subsidized by the government and they don't want their power used for mining. I don't think this will be easy because these days there are easy ways to find miners.
One way miners get discovered is just by looking at the electrical consumption. Many early miners got visits by cops because their electrical bill went up and the police assumed they were growing weed. Another way is by thermal imaging, usually some helicopters fly around and look for any areas where there is massive heat where it shouldn't be.
As Venezuelan allow me to correct you.
Mining and criptocurrency is legal here, however miners are supposed to participate in a centralized pool opened by the government and get registered as miner to get a license.
Many miners do not like this, so they stealth mine at the risk of getting caught and losing their ASICs and getting a big fine.
Usually, un-registered miners here are caught by informants or by giving a look to the electricy consumption. Government here do not have neither the logictics nor the will to use thermal imaging from a flying helicopter to catch miners.
And you are right, electricity is basically free here and mostly green, about 70%-80% comes from hydrological powered generators.
In 2015, the total of electricity production reaches 117 TWh, of which 64% comes from hydro, 19% from gas and 17% from oil. Losses however are uncommonly high, reaching 34% of production.
Hydroelectricity production is concentrated on the Caroní River in Guayana Region. Today it has 4 different dams. The largest hydroplant is the Guri dam with 10,200 MW of installed capacity, which makes it the third-largest hydroelectric plant in the world.
Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_VenezuelaIt is also well-known that confiscated ASIC are used to mine within military bases for the goverment to have at their disposal, probably to pay Iran for some products
Any other questions you may have about this lovely place, go ahead and ask.