Texas Bitcoin Miners Power Down as Heat Wave Threatens Grid with Blackouts • Hacker News Board

Re: Texas Bitcoin Miners Power Down as Heat Wave Threatens Grid with Blackouts

#11

Post by jimmysong » Tue, Jul 12, 2022, 6:04 PM UTC

treesknees wrote: post #4

xeromal wrote: post #2

Good stuff. A 1% savings, but that's does help people's ACs stay on. Texas really should start bumping up their capacity though. It's only going to get hotter.

It's over 1%. The peak grid demand according to the article was 78,206 megawatts, and the miners powered down "over 1000 megawatts", so at minimum it was 1.28% savings, potentially higher assuming the grid isn't running at that peak demand mentioned. I suppose it's good news, but also it's a bit ridiculous that 1-2% (or more) of the entire State of Texas' summer energy usage is being wasted on mining cryptocurrency.

This is a common misconception. Bitcoin mining is taking electricity generation that would otherwise be wasted. In non-peak demand times the energy is generated anyway and would simply be wasted. Bitcoin mining takes that energy and does something productive with it.

Re: Texas Bitcoin Miners Power Down as Heat Wave Threatens Grid with Blackouts

#12

Post by Feritio » Tue, Jul 12, 2022, 6:08 PM UTC

Vecr wrote: post #10

Feritio wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nope that's just bullshit. If you would price in co2 creation for no real value you would see that for society (most of us like 99,99999%) it's a net negative. It also derails investment which would make more sense as the Bitcoin market is decoupled from the normal market. The local smelter or papermill or any other energy intense industry has to play by totally other rules that Bitcoin. The fact that they claim that…

Yes, but Texas does not tax carbon, and if they want to trade off a decrease in efficiency for a increase in resilience, they can. I'm not really sure if people understand this, but preparing and stockpiling in general is highly inefficient, for example turning over smallpox vaccine stocks in the SNS does not come cheap.

They don't need Bitcoin miners for this.

They can make deals with energy intense industries.

Or invest in energy storage or just be more creative about it than trying to appeal to miners.

Re: Texas Bitcoin Miners Power Down as Heat Wave Threatens Grid with Blackouts

#13

Post by thehappypm » Tue, Jul 12, 2022, 6:08 PM UTC

jimmysong wrote: post #11

treesknees wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's over 1%. The peak grid demand according to the article was 78,206 megawatts, and the miners powered down "over 1000 megawatts", so at minimum it was 1.28% savings, potentially higher assuming the grid isn't running at that peak demand mentioned. I suppose it's good news, but also it's a bit ridiculous that 1-2% (or more) of the entire State of Texas' summer energy usage is being wasted on mining cryptocurrency.

This is a common misconception. Bitcoin mining is taking electricity generation that would otherwise be wasted. In non-peak demand times the energy is generated anyway and would simply be wasted. Bitcoin mining takes that energy and does something productive with it.

The law of conservation of energy disagrees. Sure, a miner might not noticeably increase the load on a power plant. It may only require a teeny bit more gas to flow to the turbine. But it’s not free energy.

Re: Texas Bitcoin Miners Power Down as Heat Wave Threatens Grid with Blackouts

#14

Post by bshipp » Tue, Jul 12, 2022, 6:31 PM UTC

thehappypm wrote: post #13

jimmysong wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a common misconception. Bitcoin mining is taking electricity generation that would otherwise be wasted. In non-peak demand times the energy is generated anyway and would simply be wasted. Bitcoin mining takes that energy and does something productive with it.

The law of conservation of energy disagrees. Sure, a miner might not noticeably increase the load on a power plant. It may only require a teeny bit more gas to flow to the turbine. But it’s not free energy.

I'm not sure about Texas, but lots of regions end up selling or even giving away excess power overnight that's not utilized by the grid. Not all generators can be flipped on and off like a light switch. Nuclear is a prime example.

Now, if they're still running during peak periods, that's an issue and miners should pay through the nose for it. Treat them like aluminum smelters and force them to cozy up next to hydroelectric dams to siphon off electricity before it even hits the grid.

Re: Texas Bitcoin Miners Power Down as Heat Wave Threatens Grid with Blackouts

#15

Post by badRNG » Tue, Jul 12, 2022, 7:47 PM UTC

Does >1% of all power used feel unreasonably high? I know people complain about Bitcoin power consumption, but I had no idea mining consumed power anyone on this sort of scale. Though, the Texas Blockchain Association may have an interest in overestimating the percentage of power ceded.

Re: Texas Bitcoin Miners Power Down as Heat Wave Threatens Grid with Blackouts

#16

Post by charwalker » Tue, Jul 12, 2022, 8:27 PM UTC

jimmysong wrote: post #11

treesknees wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's over 1%. The peak grid demand according to the article was 78,206 megawatts, and the miners powered down "over 1000 megawatts", so at minimum it was 1.28% savings, potentially higher assuming the grid isn't running at that peak demand mentioned. I suppose it's good news, but also it's a bit ridiculous that 1-2% (or more) of the entire State of Texas' summer energy usage is being wasted on mining cryptocurrency.

This is a common misconception. Bitcoin mining is taking electricity generation that would otherwise be wasted. In non-peak demand times the energy is generated anyway and would simply be wasted. Bitcoin mining takes that energy and does something productive with it.

That's not how electricity works.

Re: Texas Bitcoin Miners Power Down as Heat Wave Threatens Grid with Blackouts

#17

Post by over_bridge » Tue, Jul 12, 2022, 9:24 PM UTC

jimmysong wrote: post #11

treesknees wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's over 1%. The peak grid demand according to the article was 78,206 megawatts, and the miners powered down "over 1000 megawatts", so at minimum it was 1.28% savings, potentially higher assuming the grid isn't running at that peak demand mentioned. I suppose it's good news, but also it's a bit ridiculous that 1-2% (or more) of the entire State of Texas' summer energy usage is being wasted on mining cryptocurrency.

This is a common misconception. Bitcoin mining is taking electricity generation that would otherwise be wasted. In non-peak demand times the energy is generated anyway and would simply be wasted. Bitcoin mining takes that energy and does something productive with it.

If you were talking about an energy grid 100% powered by wind and solar, and it was a sunny and windy day to the point of oversupply, that would be true. Even then you could direct the energy to batteries for non windy days so it's marginal.

Maybe if energy consumption was way lower than expected, the baseload generation like geothermal and nuclear might need to dump free power. That would be an event though not a normal condition.

Otherwise you are really, really wrong.