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Bitcoin miners running up Texans' electricity bills (houstonchronicle.com)
12 points by miguelazo on Oct 24, 2023 | hide | past | favorite | 14 comments



I haven't been following crypto for a while, but I thought that there weren't really any cryptocurrencies that were profitable to mine anymore. Has something changed, or did I miss something?


That's true only for GPU based mining setups, Ethereum going Proof of Stake destroyed profitability.

The ASIC based setups mining bitcoin are still profitable.


Bitcoin has had a nice boost over the past week, since our useless regulators are on the verge of approving a Blackrock ETF for it.


It’s profitable when the state subsidizes your electricity.


Some people also don't do math well, or fall for sunk cost motivations. For example, they've already spent a bunch of money on equipment. I know someone who justified it to himself by claiming that the heat output in his house during the Winter reduced his heating bill, so the losses weren't as bad.


What was the bottom line or net result in financial terms?


Losing at least a couple hundred dollars a month. Varied based on season.


My bill hasn't changed much at all - seasonally its actually lower than last year. They're just consuming power that would otherwise be wasted...


How is power wasted? Are power companies just loading the grid with resistors when you don’t use it?


>“These figures are conservative, accounting only for mining during ‘blue sky’ hours when prices are under $15 a megawatt-hour,” the report said. “Bitcoin mining is likely to have stronger impacts on the grid over time as the number of larger and more power-hungry mining facilities is likely to grow.”


No, no, the crypto bros have told us how this lowers everyone's bills because they're only using wasted off-cycle power. This is AMAZING for consumers.


https://archive.ph/ePjBp

Houston Chronicle has previously committed to releasing articles circulating social media from the paywall, but I guess we aren’t big enough.

The guy that runs their website probably posts here, too…


In Texas up is down, right is right, and the State pays companies to use less electricity


Despite the fact they HATE this one thing called socialism. Socialize the losses and privatize the gains 'n junk




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