
Heat your home for free with heating provided by a computer server - gmays
http://news.eneco.com/heat-your-home-for-free-with-heating-provided-by-a-computer-server/
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mrb
I couldn't help but think "Bitcoin mining!" Back in 2011 I remember
discussions on bitcointalk.org about giving away Bitcoin miners disguised as
"heaters" which would, of course, mine for the manufacturer. So the
manufacturer gets all the bitcoins without paying for electricity.

Unfortunately this will never work. Space heaters are cheap enough that their
price is a non-issue. Plus they are smaller and hotter.
[http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004AQLUHC](http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004AQLUHC) is
$15, the size of a bread toaster, and 1500W. You can't have this thermal
density from a computing device.

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ConfuciusSay
This only seems practical in a handful of climates that stay cold throughout
the entire year.

Many places that have very cold winters often also have very warm summers. In
which case, do you turn the servers off in the summer?

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PeterWhittaker
That was my first thought, as well: Ottawa was wicked cold this past February
("extreme cold and wind chill warning _again_? fml..."), so it would have
required a basement full of servers to have meaningful impact...

...and we can expect our usual stupid hot, "be nice to be in Houston right
about now" peak couple of weeks, when the basement is nicest part of the house
and the AC runs pretty much non stop.

~~~
jonalmeida
Windsor here. Our winter wasn't as bad as yours, but it was one of the worst
we've ever gotten. My machines and monitors in my room keep the place nice and
toasty, but in the summer, this place is unbearable. Just sitting causes you
to break into a sweat.

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gambiting
So.....what happens if you don't need heat anymore(in the summer and such)? I
always imagined solutions like this as installing a server in a basement and
only using the hot air to heat up the house through air ducts - and if not
needed just venting the air outside. In the pictures the server looks like a
wall-hanging radiator - surely you can't just switch it off if you don't need
it?

~~~
Navarr
I don't know much about Finnish summers, but I don't imagine they get too warm

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Asparagirl
The Internet Archive already does this; their headquarters on Funston Street
in San Francisco is heated by the server banks that run archive.org. (This
occasionally makes the building a little too hot, but luckily the Richmond
District in SF is usually a fairly cool climate.)

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mcculley
I've been wondering when such a thing would take hold. If we end up with
applications amenable to homomorphic encryption, this could be more viable. It
could also lead to further changes in the relative economic power of cold
regions where electricity is cheap.

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kordless
The folks at
[https://www.cloudandheat.com/en/index.html](https://www.cloudandheat.com/en/index.html)
are doing this in Germany.

