Apr 04, 2021 20:00:00

How did the famous apple producing area, which is rich in nature, transform into the city of 'Bitcoin Mine'?

East Wenatchee , located in Washington, USA, is a city with an orchard of apples and a population of less than 15,000. American news media POLITICO interviewed how East Wenatchee was swept by Bitcoin mining companies.

This is what happens when bitcoin miners take over your town – POLITICO
https://www.politico.eu/article/this-is-what-happens-when-bitcoin-miners-take-over-your-town/

Journalist Paul Roberts, who contributed an article to POLITICO, interviewed several people involved in the Bitcoin business in East Wenatchee. One of them is Lauren Mie, a mining consultant in East Wenatchee. Originally a self-employed mining business, East Wenatchee turned to East Wenatchee because of the five dams and hydroelectric power plants on the Columbia River, which made the area very cheap. Because it was.

East Wenatchee is a specialty of apples, so Mie tried to start a mining business in an unused fruit warehouse, but the fruit warehouse had already been occupied by other miners. So Mie visited an abandoned factory in East Wenatchee and the site of a closed convenience store to find a place with good electrical equipment. Then, using the old car wash as a clue, I found a location suitable for mining and set up a

0.5 MW mining farm there. Mr. Mie turned his attention to the car wash because he thought that there should be a large power distribution station nearby because he needed to run a large pump at the car wash.

East Wenatchee and the Columbia River Basin became one of the world's leading Bitcoin producers in 2018, as other miners like Mie entered the market one after another. However, at the same time, various problems will occur, such as friction between miners and local residents, bankruptcy, lawsuits, bribery, and conflicts between miners secretly mining in basements and electric power companies that crack down on them. It is said that it became.

What has spurred these problems is the nature of Bitcoin, which is 'acceleratingly difficult to mine.' David Carlson, who works on the construction of mining farms, used to do small-scale mining at home. Realizing that the Bitcoin he earned would be a lump sum, he and his colleagues tried to launch a large-scale megawatt-class mining business, but it didn't happen.

Because bit coin number of new Issued bit coin halved every once every 4 years '

half-life because they are designed to' occurs, not stand the prospect of future profitability Because it is. In addition to this, Bitcoin also had the problem that the 'mining difficulty (difficulty) ' required for mining increased over time, and it was necessary to constantly add or update mining equipment accordingly. ..

Faced with these problems, miners were forced to expand their mining farms or switch to another business, like Carlson. 'I think it was just a matter of electricity bills that separated the survivors from the losers,' Carlson said of the difficulty of mining, which requires constant expansion.

Mining companies are not the only ones suffering from the problem of mining consuming a lot of electricity. John Stall, the leader of maintenance workers at an electric power company in Chelan County, Washington, calls a company that secretly mine in private homes a 'rogue operator.' According to Stall, small miners like Rogue Operators can overwhelm the home power grid as they mine without proper permission or sufficient equipment. thing. In addition, it is said that the transformer overheated due to overloading by the mining company, causing a forest fire.

Due to these infrastructure restrictions, mining in the Columbia River basin is reaching its limit. 'We don't have enough power lines and infrastructure in the Columbia River basin anymore, so we'll be traveling around the United States and Canada to find mining locations,' Carlson said in an email to Roberts.

'The long-term outlook for crypto assets and mining businesses in the Columbia River basin is bright,' Mie said, but pointed out that the era in which miners can mine with their own funds is over. 'I have two children, so I'm not going to take the risk of borrowing to take part in the scale-up competition. Bitcoin is getting bigger risk and return, but I'm at the forefront of the fight. I don't want to put it, 'he commented.