There’s a few ingredients left in the back of the fridge that might catch your attention, and hopefully satisfy your appetite. Let’s see if these leftovers are actually edible…
Nuclear Power + Bitcoin = ???
Last time around we have reviewed plenty of original ways to mine cryptocurrency where the unique method had zero actual efficiency.
It is too slow to mine crypto on a piece of paper and not much better with a moon computer, plus it is too wasteful to mine using free dormitory power when you’re a hungry student. But what if there’s an option on the opposite side of the spectrum? What if there is a way to mine crypto that was actually overpowered to work?
Two words only – nuclear power.
Sure thing, nobody has built a nuclear reactor specifically to mine crypto or has a reactor collecting dust at home. Even if someone did, they would totally wreck it all. Talking about a 51% attack, where miners who control more than 50% of the network’s mining hash rate get the power to alter the blockchain. The sheer might of a nuclear reactor produces too much energy, about 5.1 TWh annually.
But hey, nuclear mining can be a thing! Mining could utilize excess energy generated by reactors outside peak consumption periods, thus reducing the stress of powering such facilities.
Experts claim that it’s actually better to burn off excess energy than waste it, as nuclear plants are more efficient, safer and have a longer lifespan when they operate closer to their full capacity. Who knew BTC could be so helpful, eh?
Business Opportunity For Oil and Gas Industry
At first, I really wanted to say ‘business opportunity for gassy people’ in the title, but common sense prevailed. We are talking about serious things, after all.
Not a lot of my readers will ever get close to operating a nuclear reactor, so let’s take it closer to the ground. How about using natural gas, the byproduct of oil extraction, to do a bit of mining?
Drilling companies have trouble finding a profitable market for excess fuel and just vent that yuck into the atmosphere, increasing the carbon footprint in the process. Not only they are slowly squeezing the life out of our planet, they are also restricted in the amount of gas that can be released or burned, as exceeding these limits usually leads to costly production stoppages.
Enter mobile mining datacenters that can be installed at oil company facilities. Those bad boys provide a solution to the aforementioned problem – the generators utilize the surplus gas to produce electricity, which is then used to mine cryptocurrency. Not only this finances the company’s operations, it also spares the nature off methane!
Oil producers remain compliant with venting quotas and receive additional income, while ensuring uninterrupted oil extraction. Additionally, they can bring in over 15 times more revenue than the market price of the fuel – win-win situation for all sides.
A Shocking Way To Exploit Your Tesla
The chances of you owning a Tesla are a bit higher than you being a nuclear reactor operator or an oil industry professional, so let’s talk about a more accessible way to mine some coins.
Warning – this is a borderline braggadocious way to mine cryptocurrency that may attract new followers to your hate club. Additionally, you need to be a somewhat qualified car enthusiast to make the whip do the mining job.
So, a San Francisco-based gentleman by the name of Siraj Raval once decided that it would be a grand idea to hook up interconnected graphics processing units to the car’s internal battery. Voiding car warranty? Meh, whatever. Raval claims it was worth it and that he netted as much as $800 a month in 2021 hey day.
If you think about it, mining from a Tesla is just like connecting to any other power source, so if it is cheaper doing it through an electric vehicle, who are we to judge the lad? There are other ways around this though. An electric car guru Chris Allessi tried mining bitcoin by plugging a Bitmain Antminer S9 into his car battery with the help of a power inverter. The inverter adjusted the voltage of Tesla’s electric battery to a compatible level.
He used the built-in computer and screen in the car to navigate to a web page that he had set up specifically to mine for Monero. That’s a criminally smart way to make Tesla pay you back!
Cryptojacking – Combining Mining and Hacking
Speaking of something criminal, let’s talk about hackers who don’t waste an extra penny to mine.
As you might guess, the cheapest way to mine cryptocurrency is to do that using someone else’s devices. Sounds too good to be true because it is – the secret ingredient is crime. Per wiki, cryptojacking is the act of hijacking a computer to mine cryptocurrencies against the user’s will, through websites, or while the user is unaware.
Visiting a malicious website is only one of the ways to pick up a mining virus. You may also encounter crypto miners while playing your favorite mobile games! Nowhere is safe, sadly.
What makes it even worse, you booting some joyful mobile game on a smartphone actually makes cryptojacking only quasi malicious, since you launch the program on your own. And yes, this is definitely not healthy for your smartphone, as cryptojacking slowly wears it down.
I wrote about cryptojacking in my book, so you may jump over to ‘The Art of Email Security’ to learn more about it. The book was published more than 3 years ago, but still stands the test of time, if I dare say so myself!
Everybody Loves The Sunshine, Even Crypto
Gold glimmers nicely on the sun, and even though digital gold doesn’t, it can look mesmerizing thanks to the spicy star.
Let’s agree, one of the most beautiful sights in this world is digits that are growing in your favor, and with the power of solar energy, those numbers could grow like weed. Yes, it is possible to mine cryptocurrency with a gentle touch of the sun and a bunch of panels! Going solar helps to reduce fossil fuel demand, lower greenhouse emissions, and reduce the carbon footprint too.
Not only solar crypto mining is environmentally friendly, it can also be reliable if your location is good and you have a nice, broad roof. It doesn’t work that well if you’re in Belgium…
Apart from not having sunrays dependently falling on your place of residence, the other thing to consider is the actual cost of solar panels, their installation, and expenses related to the rig itself. Size and quality of panels matter too, so it may get fairly expensive. Here’s a formula for you – take monthly electric usage from the mining rig, divide it by month
ly peak sun hours, and multiply the result by 1,000. The resulting number is divided by the power rating of the solar panel.
If you have done some ‘quick maffs’, it is possible that you are already on your way to buy around 30 solar panels… But hey, if you’re in it for the long run, who am I to stop you?
Even though it might take you years to break even, nothing is cooler than generating your own electricity and throwing the waste argument out of the conversation!
Finally, You Can Make Money By Sleeping!
In case you didn’t know, being hot can theoretically be monetized even if you’re not the sun.
Specifications are needed, because there are plenty of websites where beautiful people get paid for being attractive, but we’re not talking about that today. This last part has nothing to do with the weather we have outside either.
I’m talking about a way to harvest energy from body heat to power cryptocurrency-mining computers, pioneered by a Netherlands-based company Speculative.Capital.
To make it possible, the company created special body suits, Matrix style. 37 people were involved in the project, and by ‘involved’ I mean they had a nap for a few hours while the suit did its magic. Sadly, you won’t get a Scrooge McDuck levels of coinage from this activity, as the project looks more like an art installation than an efficient way to earn crypto.
In 212 hours of the experiment, 127,210 milliwatts were generated to mined 16,954 units of different cryptocurrencies. You would only be able to mine 0.002487 of Ethereum a day and that is using all 127,210 milliwatts, but still, 80% of the earnings were divided among the participants in the experiment, and the rest was transferred to the institute. Stonks!
A little factoid for you to remember and impress your friends – an adult human body generates approximately 100 watts of power while at rest, and about 80% of this power is wasted.
If you have enjoyed going down the mining rabbit hole today, be sure to hop into my personal blog, maybe you will dig your way to some hidden gem there? As this article proves, nothing is impossible. It’s been a pleasure as always, and I will see you soon. Don’t go chaining!