By Susie Violet Ward · Forbes · 6 November 2023
Faced with rising energy costs and environmental concerns, bitcoin miners were adopting new cooling and operating techniques. Isaac Holyoak of CleanSpark said immersion cooling raised hash rates without a matching rise in power consumption, and that by underclocking machines the company could mine “the equivalent of 1.3 bitcoin for the energy typically required to mine a single one.” The article notes that some of these techniques were being taken up by traditional data centres.
James Behan of Chainergy described powering mining with biomethane from local pig slurry and maize and supplying surplus energy to the community grid, while warning that changing subsidy schemes threatened stability. Daniel Roberts of Iris Energy explained how its sites mined with wind and solar power but could switch off almost instantly during weather events, acting as “a demand-side battery” and returning power to the grid.