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But if you smelt aluminium, you have valuable aluminium. It's disingenuous to pretend (without any sourcing) that bitcoin is only mined using electricity that

But if you smelt aluminium, you have valuable aluminium. It's disingenuous to pretend (without any sourcing) that bitcoin is only mined using electricity that would otherwise have been wasted. If this were really true, then bitcoin miners should all be getting paid to act as load banks[0] for their local electrical grid and soak up that excess power. Since they are instead paying for electricity, they are using valuable electricity, not spare/waste power. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load_bank https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load_bank

zyphr 6y ago
That is exactly what power companies are going to do.
mightybyte 6y ago
> But if you smelt aluminium, you have valuable aluminium. And it's useless until you spend more energy to move it to where people want it. > It's disingenuous to pretend (without any sourcing) that bitcoin is only mined using electricity that would otherwise have been wasted. It doesn't have to be only mined that way. You're being absolutist. Competition has resulted in bitcoin mining being very sensitive to energy costs. It stands to reason that miners--especially the ones operating at large scale--will move to places where there is cheap energy. https://www.publish0x.com/muchograph/top-5-biggest-bitcoin-mining-farms-in-the-world-with-picture-xqmyqr https://www.publish0x.com/muchograph/top-5-biggest-bitcoin-m... Several of the big mining operations mentioned there are located in places known for cheap electricity. Genesis mining relocated to Canada and Iceland specifically for cheaper power. Gigawatt is located in Washington State which has some of the cheapest electricity in the U.S. (part of the reason Google chose The Dalles, OR for one of their data centers).