47 ms·

A Bitcoin Mining Operation Started a Secret Power Plant, It Did Not Go as Plannd

47 points by ourmandave 5y ago

iJohnDoe 5y ago
Enough to power 6000 homes? That’s crazy. Probably a silly question. Does solving the complex mathematical problems provide any long term benefit? Breaking encryption or other uses?
- matheusmoreira 5y ago
  It provides a decentralized ledger.
- fabstei 5y ago
  No. Their only purpose is to act as a kind of receipt: "look, I actually really did waste all this energy". The solution to the puzzle itself is irrelevant - it's an operation that would be extremely simple but that's made very, very hard on purpose. And the sole purpose is to align incentives by using lots of energy.
  - pishpash 5y ago
    Even finding Mersenne primes would be a more useful proof of work.
- creshal 5y ago
  No. It's literally just busywork to burn resources, to prove that you aren't using the resources for anything better. PoW needs to be made illegal at this rate.
  - Gosper 5y ago
    That's incorrect. The busywork is to prove that a certain amount of time is likely to have elapsed, as a coordination mechanism in a network of unreliable, uncoordinated, or even adversarial actors. PoW is valued by the network and its participants. What needs to be accounted for are the carbon and other negative externalities dumped into our singular shared environment. This is a massive global problem that you do a disservice by focusing on PoW.
- BLKNSLVR 5y ago
  Bitcoin is only 13 years old, and is still a very unproven technology to the eyes of the many. However, the "value" being provided by this (admittedly large amount of) power is in the securing of a global, decentralized payment system. That's what it's designed to do. Beyond that, no, there's no _additional_ value. If you can start from the position of assuming Bitcoin is a thing worth existing (which may be asking a lot, but bear with me), then this security, and the power usage that enables it, is a required element of the overall thing. ie. if it's worth Bitcoin existing, then it's worth the power usage to secure it so it can continue existing. Having said all of that, and I've said this before, I think Bitcoin's Proof-of-Work as security is what will bring it down in the long term. Ethereum, the next biggest cryptocurrency, is moving (glacially, but right now we're the closest we've ever been...) towards Proof-of-Stake, which radically sheds a massive percentage of the power requirements to secure the network. There are other potential drawbacks to PoS, but that's a whole separate loaded discussion that I'm not across well enough to engage in. I believe Bitcoin will have to move to some less power intensive security method in the not-too-distant future in order to remain viable. This has been accelerated by the fact that COVID is messing with supply chains and semi-conductor availability, meaning the value of Bitcoin mining equipment is increasing (from a supply / demand standpoint if nothing else).
- imtringued 5y ago
  One day the blockchain will gain a random mutation and then it will find a way to run an unconstrained superhuman AI on the blockchain infrastructure. Bitcoin is just an AI embryo trying to convince foolish humans to give it energy and once it can build its own robotic army it will get rid of humans or we just keep it happy by building an exponentially growing number of dyson spheres. I'm sorry guys but the Matrix human battery concept is just wrong.
albertsondev 5y ago
Somebody should probably fix that typo [Plannd -> Planned].
- readthenotes1 5y ago
  I thought it was a cute intentional typo
  - AlexCoventry 5y ago
    I don't get it.
    - xref 5y ago
      The speling didn’t go as planned
      - AlexCoventry 5y ago
        Thanks.
- herpderperator 5y ago
  It's probably max title length.
krasin 5y ago
I predict that in 10 years, a secret nuclear power plant will be uncovered that was built specifically to mine cryptocurrencies. And the construction costs would be 10x lower per Watt of output than what we see in the conventional nuclear (as none of the safety regulation would need to be met).
- hunter-gatherer 5y ago
  A few years ago I would say that statement is absurd. But now it doesn't seem to fanatical.
  - krasin 5y ago
    I am personally rather a pessimist about the whole thing (despite being a fascinating economical quirk), but yeah: people repeatedly demonstrated that they will do anything for profit. That said, direct coal pit to furnace to mining rig pipeline is going to be developed & prohibited before we see nuclear mining ventures.
- sanp 5y ago
  Given that it is 10x cheaper perhaps we will find out earlier...
- post_from_work 5y ago
  Hmmmm.....what about cobbling together RTG batteries to power a mining rig?
  - Dylan16807 5y ago
    Very expensive.
  - sandworm101 5y ago
    Considering that large RTGs generally pump out less power than is needed to run a modern graphics card I doubt they would ever turn a profit. The RTG in this picture is five feet tall and is probably worth several million. For that you get a total of about 300watts of power. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:RTG_radiation_measurement.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:RTG_radiation_measurement...
literallyWTF 5y ago
Fucking Bitcoin. Is there any other “technology” that’s so wasteful as-well as it’s completely useless?
- axiolite 5y ago
  > Is there any other “technology” that’s so wasteful as-well as it’s completely useless? Screen savers?
  - xkeysc0re 5y ago
    Not if you still have older CRT monitors or plasma screens. Also login / lock screens are essentially just screen savers
    - axiolite 5y ago
      Screen blanking and DPMS power-off accomplish the same goals, with considerably less energy usage.
      - floatingatoll 5y ago
        Didn’t it used to be necessary to exercise the pixels to keep them from burning in, rather than just turning off the screen? Or is that a thing that started with plasma TVs.
- soylentnewsorg 5y ago
  define useless. toys are useless. playing cards are useless. what exactly is the purpose of sports - having a ball go in a round wire hole? oh, that's entertainment and people need that. well so is this. it's quite literally playing poker. now, as far as wasteful - cruise ships are worse. people using non-rechargeable AA batteries.
  - pishpash 5y ago
    Most games are entertaining because they improve overall fitness so we're rewarded with a dopamine hit for positive reinforcement: toys - develops mental capacity of infants sports - improves health outcomes and/or teamwork playing poker - trains models of decision under uncertainty Now, Bitcoin mining - ?
quotz 5y ago
“Link Global CEO Stephen Jenkins told Gizmodo that this is pretty normal, and the secret-borrowing part was just a side effect of navigating a difficult regulatory landscape. “We run on abandoned gas sites and have been working with the utilities commission to bring them into compliance,” Jenkins said, adding that compliance has been “our main challenge as bitcoin mining is new to the energy regulatory framework and going first can be hard sometimes.” He said the company has “learned a lot” and will apply those lessons in the future.” Well this is quite important rather than just the clickbait title
- dundarious 5y ago
  That's a particularly credulous take, given the circumstances. You can't just gesticulate and say, "regulations, eh?", and get away with theft. > The neighbors convened, CBC News reports, and discovered that Link Global had not notified anyone, not even the public utility commission or the well’s owner Maga Energy. Taking without telling the owner—stealing, in other words.
  - quotz 5y ago
    I assume with a good legal team that he can probably afford, they would not advise him to state what he did since he could incriminate himself further. The situation is probably not that serious for him to be stating that in public. Or hes crazy.
    - dundarious 5y ago
      Beyond the implicit admission that the power plant did indeed operate, and that there is a “disagreement” about the legitimacy of its operation, saying “it’s just a big misunderstanding” is not self-incrimination. I think that’s a weak argument with some large logical leaps, and it certainly does nothing to indicate this article was clickbait.
    - JamisonM 5y ago
      I wouldn't assume they have a good legal team, its a penny stock with a market cap that is almost eclipsed by the fines they are facing from Alberta regulators.
someperson 5y ago
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/link-global-bitcoin-mine-alberta-1.6137731 https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/link-global-bitcoin-m... [Aug 2021]
Borrible 5y ago
They should have made a deal with Black Rock like some fleeing Chinese did. Or one of the other dozen or so Petrol/Gas Companies with facilities in that area. They know how to handle such hassles.

47 points by ourmandave 5y ago

Enough to power 6000 homes? That’s crazy. Probably a silly question. Does solving the complex mathematical problems provide any long term benefit? Breaking encryption or other uses?

matheusmoreira 5y ago
It provides a decentralized ledger.
fabstei 5y ago
No. Their only purpose is to act as a kind of receipt: "look, I actually really did waste all this energy". The solution to the puzzle itself is irrelevant - it's an operation that would be extremely simple but that's made very, very hard on purpose. And the sole purpose is to align incentives by using lots of energy.
- pishpash 5y ago
  Even finding Mersenne primes would be a more useful proof of work.
creshal 5y ago
No. It's literally just busywork to burn resources, to prove that you aren't using the resources for anything better. PoW needs to be made illegal at this rate.
- Gosper 5y ago
  That's incorrect. The busywork is to prove that a certain amount of time is likely to have elapsed, as a coordination mechanism in a network of unreliable, uncoordinated, or even adversarial actors. PoW is valued by the network and its participants. What needs to be accounted for are the carbon and other negative externalities dumped into our singular shared environment. This is a massive global problem that you do a disservice by focusing on PoW.
BLKNSLVR 5y ago
Bitcoin is only 13 years old, and is still a very unproven technology to the eyes of the many. However, the "value" being provided by this (admittedly large amount of) power is in the securing of a global, decentralized payment system. That's what it's designed to do. Beyond that, no, there's no _additional_ value. If you can start from the position of assuming Bitcoin is a thing worth existing (which may be asking a lot, but bear with me), then this security, and the power usage that enables it, is a required element of the overall thing. ie. if it's worth Bitcoin existing, then it's worth the power usage to secure it so it can continue existing. Having said all of that, and I've said this before, I think Bitcoin's Proof-of-Work as security is what will bring it down in the long term. Ethereum, the next biggest cryptocurrency, is moving (glacially, but right now we're the closest we've ever been...) towards Proof-of-Stake, which radically sheds a massive percentage of the power requirements to secure the network. There are other potential drawbacks to PoS, but that's a whole separate loaded discussion that I'm not across well enough to engage in. I believe Bitcoin will have to move to some less power intensive security method in the not-too-distant future in order to remain viable. This has been accelerated by the fact that COVID is messing with supply chains and semi-conductor availability, meaning the value of Bitcoin mining equipment is increasing (from a supply / demand standpoint if nothing else).
imtringued 5y ago
One day the blockchain will gain a random mutation and then it will find a way to run an unconstrained superhuman AI on the blockchain infrastructure. Bitcoin is just an AI embryo trying to convince foolish humans to give it energy and once it can build its own robotic army it will get rid of humans or we just keep it happy by building an exponentially growing number of dyson spheres. I'm sorry guys but the Matrix human battery concept is just wrong.

albertsondev 5y ago

Somebody should probably fix that typo [Plannd -> Planned].

readthenotes1 5y ago
I thought it was a cute intentional typo
- AlexCoventry 5y ago
  I don't get it.
  - xref 5y ago
    The speling didn’t go as planned
    - AlexCoventry 5y ago
      Thanks.
herpderperator 5y ago
It's probably max title length.

krasin 5y ago

I predict that in 10 years, a secret nuclear power plant will be uncovered that was built specifically to mine cryptocurrencies. And the construction costs would be 10x lower per Watt of output than what we see in the conventional nuclear (as none of the safety regulation would need to be met).

hunter-gatherer 5y ago
A few years ago I would say that statement is absurd. But now it doesn't seem to fanatical.
- krasin 5y ago
  I am personally rather a pessimist about the whole thing (despite being a fascinating economical quirk), but yeah: people repeatedly demonstrated that they will do anything for profit. That said, direct coal pit to furnace to mining rig pipeline is going to be developed & prohibited before we see nuclear mining ventures.
sanp 5y ago
Given that it is 10x cheaper perhaps we will find out earlier...
post_from_work 5y ago
Hmmmm.....what about cobbling together RTG batteries to power a mining rig?
- Dylan16807 5y ago
  Very expensive.
- sandworm101 5y ago
  Considering that large RTGs generally pump out less power than is needed to run a modern graphics card I doubt they would ever turn a profit. The RTG in this picture is five feet tall and is probably worth several million. For that you get a total of about 300watts of power. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:RTG_radiation_measurement.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:RTG_radiation_measurement...

literallyWTF 5y ago

Fucking Bitcoin. Is there any other “technology” that’s so wasteful as-well as it’s completely useless?

axiolite 5y ago
> Is there any other “technology” that’s so wasteful as-well as it’s completely useless? Screen savers?
- xkeysc0re 5y ago
  Not if you still have older CRT monitors or plasma screens. Also login / lock screens are essentially just screen savers
  - axiolite 5y ago
    Screen blanking and DPMS power-off accomplish the same goals, with considerably less energy usage.
    - floatingatoll 5y ago
      Didn’t it used to be necessary to exercise the pixels to keep them from burning in, rather than just turning off the screen? Or is that a thing that started with plasma TVs.
soylentnewsorg 5y ago
define useless. toys are useless. playing cards are useless. what exactly is the purpose of sports - having a ball go in a round wire hole? oh, that's entertainment and people need that. well so is this. it's quite literally playing poker. now, as far as wasteful - cruise ships are worse. people using non-rechargeable AA batteries.
- pishpash 5y ago
  Most games are entertaining because they improve overall fitness so we're rewarded with a dopamine hit for positive reinforcement: toys - develops mental capacity of infants sports - improves health outcomes and/or teamwork playing poker - trains models of decision under uncertainty Now, Bitcoin mining - ?

quotz 5y ago

“Link Global CEO Stephen Jenkins told Gizmodo that this is pretty normal, and the secret-borrowing part was just a side effect of navigating a difficult regulatory landscape. “We run on abandoned gas sites and have been working with the utilities commission to bring them into compliance,” Jenkins said, adding that compliance has been “our main challenge as bitcoin mining is new to the energy regulatory framework and going first can be hard sometimes.” He said the company has “learned a lot” and will apply those lessons in the future.” Well this is quite important rather than just the clickbait title

dundarious 5y ago
That's a particularly credulous take, given the circumstances. You can't just gesticulate and say, "regulations, eh?", and get away with theft. > The neighbors convened, CBC News reports, and discovered that Link Global had not notified anyone, not even the public utility commission or the well’s owner Maga Energy. Taking without telling the owner—stealing, in other words.
- quotz 5y ago
  I assume with a good legal team that he can probably afford, they would not advise him to state what he did since he could incriminate himself further. The situation is probably not that serious for him to be stating that in public. Or hes crazy.
  - dundarious 5y ago
    Beyond the implicit admission that the power plant did indeed operate, and that there is a “disagreement” about the legitimacy of its operation, saying “it’s just a big misunderstanding” is not self-incrimination. I think that’s a weak argument with some large logical leaps, and it certainly does nothing to indicate this article was clickbait.
  - JamisonM 5y ago
    I wouldn't assume they have a good legal team, its a penny stock with a market cap that is almost eclipsed by the fines they are facing from Alberta regulators.

someperson 5y ago

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/link-global-bitcoin-mine-alberta-1.6137731 https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/link-global-bitcoin-m... [Aug 2021]

Borrible 5y ago

They should have made a deal with Black Rock like some fleeing Chinese did. Or one of the other dozen or so Petrol/Gas Companies with facilities in that area. They know how to handle such hassles.