El Salvador has mined its first coins
Depending on the Bitcoin exchange rate, El Salvador could generate tens of millions of US dollars per month from mining the crypto currency using volcanic energy. It started rather slowly now.
When El Salvador was the first country in the world to introduce Bitcoin as an official means of payment in September, the price of the crypto currency initially rose briefly – and then crashed. How much Nayib Bukele, President of the Central American country, is behind the project could be seen from the fact that El Salvador later bought a lot of coins. In addition, Bukele announced in June that his country wanted to mine Bitcoins – with volcanic energy. Now the mining project has started.
As usual, via tweet, President Bukele announced on Friday that El Salvador had mined the first Bitcoin units – 0.00599179 BTC to be precise. At the current rate of $ 47,500, this corresponds to just under $ 285. The reason why it is no longer is that new mining equipment currently has to be “tested and installed”, says Bukele. But the beginning is done. Bukele started mining on Tuesday with one 25-second video teasedwhich has already been viewed 2.3 million times.
Bitcoin mining with the help of geothermal energy is nothing new and has been practiced in Iceland for years. In El Salvador, known as the land of volcanoes, geothermal energy makes up almost a quarter of the energy mix. The project attracted particular attention in conjunction with the plans to make Bitcoin the official means of payment.
And, of course, because the high power consumption of Bitcoin generation, which to a certain extent is also covered by coal-fired power plants, repeatedly arouses criticism. Mining and transactions via Bitcoin are currently said to consume as much energy annually as the Netherlands. The less environmentally friendly power generation is regulated, the higher the CO2 emissions. For this reason, Elon Musk stopped paying Tesla with Bitcoin in May.
According to El Salvador, the energy obtained from the volcanoes is not only very cheap, but also 100 percent clean and renewable. The Salvadoran company Lageo SA de CV, which specializes in geothermal energy, is responsible for the project. It had announced that it could provide 95 megawatts a month. According to calculations by a crypto expert, that would mean around 1,800 Bitcoin mined per month – around $ 85.5 million (at a rate of $ 47,500).
The Bitcoin project in El Salvador also includes the Chivo crypto wallet. Chivo means something like cool. The wallet is said to be used by more than 2.1 million Salvadorans. According to Bukele a few days ago, there are more users than at any bank in El Salvador, such as CNBC writes.
