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China’s Bitcoin miners flee Inner Mongolia ahead of crypto mining ban

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Re: China’s Bitcoin miners flee Inner Mongolia ahead of crypto mining ban

#71

Post by sudosysgen »

rtkwe wrote: post #53
klmadfejno wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

10% sounds like a lot.

Especially when China constitutes about 70% of the hashrate for bitcoin. (I'm also dubious of how they know what is powering the mining operations inside China, most of the power in China still comes from coal.)

Coal is more expensive in China. So if you're doing something that is reliant on energy and doesn't need to be close to physical supply chains, there is a huge incentive to move to provinces where renewable (cheaper) energy is available.

Re: China’s Bitcoin miners flee Inner Mongolia ahead of crypto mining ban

#72

Post by sudosysgen »

space_rock wrote: post #60
bradleyjg wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s subsidized power and these “businesses” are effectively just reselling that power to foreigners at a markup. No government would want to participate in that.

Nothing is worse for the environment then subsidized coal power. Uneconomical environmental destruction

I agree with you in theory, but in practice it's the only way to be competitive as a poor country. From the perspective of most countries that do this the only thing you can do is build more renewables.

Re: China’s Bitcoin miners flee Inner Mongolia ahead of crypto mining ban

#73

Post by keymone »

andrewflnr wrote: post #68
keymone wrote: post #61

i feel like HN's outrage about bitcoin mining is just virtue signaling. 1. bitcoin has created a market where people purchase security of their assets with the ultimate currency - energy. that market isn't going anywhere, the idea is out of the bag and you can't un-discover it. 2. energy consumption is not what causes carbon emissions, energy production does. stop chasing consumers and start regulating producers if y…

Maybe you didn't mean it quite this way, but: "virtue signalling" is not evil, it's an integral part of human social dynamics, probably since before agriculture. And if you think you never do it, I think you're deluding yourself.

not evil, more like "people jump to conclusion that's easy to stick by instead of spending a few brain cycles to consider why it could be wrong".

Re: China’s Bitcoin miners flee Inner Mongolia ahead of crypto mining ban

#74

Post by aww_dang »

sudosysgen wrote: post #67
aww_dang wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Market rates for electricity do not exist in a country where the power grid is controlled by communists. Given that most countries subsidize electricity consumption the same basic issue applies. Yes, that's a problem in my view. Observing that it is the status quo doesn't rationalize it or further prohibitions to defend price controls. I'm not sure if you would regard it as naive, but price controls are widely regar…

I live in Québec. We have state run electricty, which turns a profit and isn't subsidized. It's by far the cheapest in North America, and the essentially the cheapest unsubsidized energy in the world. The grid is also 99.9% renewable (everywhere except for some islands) So the idea that price controls and nationalization somehow causes inefficiency in this case is just a tale economists tell themselves. In the real w…

If Quebec is running a profitable business, there's no argument in what I wrote?

The most I could say is that there may be unseen costs of nationalization. I.e. it could be cheaper still if privatized, but that is further afield from the discussion. In HN parlance I suppose I could demand that you provide evidence and sources proving the same power stations wouldn't operate more efficiently under private ownership, but I don't think that would be fair or friendly.

Re: China’s Bitcoin miners flee Inner Mongolia ahead of crypto mining ban

#75

Post by sudosysgen »

aww_dang wrote: post #74
sudosysgen wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in Québec. We have state run electricty, which turns a profit and isn't subsidized. It's by far the cheapest in North America, and the essentially the cheapest unsubsidized energy in the world. The grid is also 99.9% renewable (everywhere except for some islands) So the idea that price controls and nationalization somehow causes inefficiency in this case is just a tale economists tell themselves. In the real w…

If Quebec is running a profitable business, there's no argument in what I wrote? The most I could say is that there may be unseen costs of nationalization. I.e. it could be cheaper still if privatized, but that is further afield from the discussion. In HN parlance I suppose I could demand that you provide evidence and sources proving the same power stations wouldn't operate more efficiently under private ownership, b…

There is no market. It has a monopoly, and there are things you aren't allowed to do with the energy.

It's not a business, either.

Re: China’s Bitcoin miners flee Inner Mongolia ahead of crypto mining ban

#76

Post by tim333 »

keymone wrote: post #61

i feel like HN's outrage about bitcoin mining is just virtue signaling. 1. bitcoin has created a market where people purchase security of their assets with the ultimate currency - energy. that market isn't going anywhere, the idea is out of the bag and you can't un-discover it. 2. energy consumption is not what causes carbon emissions, energy production does. stop chasing consumers and start regulating producers if y…

You say it's not going anywhere but things can change. Bitcoin's energy use is roughly proportional to the price. If people sell bitcoin and buy another currency that is more proof of stake the energy useage can go down.

Re: China’s Bitcoin miners flee Inner Mongolia ahead of crypto mining ban

#77

Post by aww_dang »

sudosysgen wrote: post #75
aww_dang wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Quebec is running a profitable business, there's no argument in what I wrote? The most I could say is that there may be unseen costs of nationalization. I.e. it could be cheaper still if privatized, but that is further afield from the discussion. In HN parlance I suppose I could demand that you provide evidence and sources proving the same power stations wouldn't operate more efficiently under private ownership, b…

There is no market. It has a monopoly, and there are things you aren't allowed to do with the energy. It's not a business, either.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydro-Qu%C3%A9bec#Quebec_marke...

Re: China’s Bitcoin miners flee Inner Mongolia ahead of crypto mining ban

#78

Post by keymone »

tim333 wrote: post #76
keymone wrote: post #61

i feel like HN's outrage about bitcoin mining is just virtue signaling. 1. bitcoin has created a market where people purchase security of their assets with the ultimate currency - energy. that market isn't going anywhere, the idea is out of the bag and you can't un-discover it. 2. energy consumption is not what causes carbon emissions, energy production does. stop chasing consumers and start regulating producers if y…

You say it's not going anywhere but things can change. Bitcoin's energy use is roughly proportional to the price. If people sell bitcoin and buy another currency that is more proof of stake the energy useage can go down.

sure, but that's the natural progression of things which i have nothing against.

Re: China’s Bitcoin miners flee Inner Mongolia ahead of crypto mining ban

#79

Post by rorykoehler »

foepys wrote: post #62
latchkey wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought this thread from Dan Held was really good: https://twitter.com/danheld/status/1351235080103096331 It starts off with: "1/ Bitcoin’s energy consumption is not “wasteful.” - It is much more efficient than existing financial systems - No one has the moral authority to tell you what is a good or bad use of energy (ex: watching the Kardashians) Let's debunk this FUD"

How is it more useful if >6 billion people are using the traditional system and a few hundred thousand, maybe a million are using cryptocurrencies while consuming an amount of electricity equivalent to Denmark? Bitcoin, Ethereum etc. can be spent nearly nowhere except at exchanges because it's a pain in the ass to handle for merchants while I can pay with my Visa in the most countries seamlessly. And how can it "bank…

Denmark has a population of less than 6 million

Re: China’s Bitcoin miners flee Inner Mongolia ahead of crypto mining ban

#80

Post by foepys »

rorykoehler wrote: post #79
foepys wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is it more useful if >6 billion people are using the traditional system and a few hundred thousand, maybe a million are using cryptocurrencies while consuming an amount of electricity equivalent to Denmark? Bitcoin, Ethereum etc. can be spent nearly nowhere except at exchanges because it's a pain in the ass to handle for merchants while I can pay with my Visa in the most countries seamlessly. And how can it "bank…

Denmark has a population of less than 6 million

This is including industry like aluminum smelting which are basically running their own power plants to work. Aluminum is either used directly or indirectly for everything produced.

It's also including households, trains, data centers, etc. Things people actually use to live. Meanwhile with Bitcoin people are just rushing to calculate as much zeros as possible into their hash to append 1 MB of data to a chain.

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