Topic: America's first nuclear-powered bitcoin mining farm (Read 335 times)

Transmission losses account for about 20%, and of course you need to maintain those transmission lines. If you consume it locally (at the generation), then not only you have that extra 20% capacity back, you also skip the maintenance cost of the lines.

What people need to understand for electricity cost is: You pay next to nothing for the actual creation of the electricity. What makes it expensive is the power loss if you let it travel through long wires and the price to maintain the wiring.
So if you can get a spot right next to a power plant where these factors are not an issue, 0.02 Cents is very possible and be a reasonable price. Lets hope they have long running contracts however. There are many people that want to harm bitcoin and this company will for sure be an easy target if you can just increase prices. They are basically 100% on the power plant that is next to them.

Just because it's cheap for usage doesn't mean it should be found in every corners of the globe. This is because of the he potential danger and threat it pose among nations in the international arena as relating to power tussle. Nuclear energy despite it's environmental friendly advantage is believed to be linked with nuclear weapons and this raises a high degree of restrictions to it's build up .

If Nuclear Energy is cheap, why aren't we seeing widespread use of it as compared to fossil fuel?

A simple Google search using "how much does a nuclear power plant cost to build" will answer that... In short, it is many billions of $$$ though at least in the US a huge part of that is from time lost (in some cases decades) and legal expenses due to every 'environmental' group in any given country fighting them in court. In more than a few cases construction was drawn out for so long that it became necessary to finish building the power plants to use natural gas fired steam turbines instead of carbon-neutral reactors as the heat source. One Poster Child for that is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midland_Cogeneration_Venture

That link also highlights the primary safety hazard associated with nuclear power - the absolute need to get all of the engineering points right! IF done using what should be common-sense design and operations rules nuclear power IS safer, cleaner, and certainly more stable than almost any way of generating utility-scale electric power.

Ya know, things like: do not build on the shore of an ocean bay at risk from tsunami and if you do - at least locate the backup power generators above any possible flood line (Fukushima), do not run 'what if' tests on an already sketchy reactor design using an operational reactor (Chernobyl), make sure ALL build inspections are accurate, operation centers are thoughtfully laid out and operators are properly trained (TMI), be sure to build on stable ground (would have been an issue with the Midland reactors), do not build near an earthquake fault line (San Onofre closed before anything happened, also several falsified inspections found, botched repairs), etc.

That said it must be pointed out that because of its stringent design, build, and operations rules the US Naval nuclear program has had only 1 significant incident. That single one was a coolant leak that resulted in full immediate SCRAM shutdown of the reactor. ref https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_naval_reactors
From that link:
Too bad the Russian program has never been as careful...

As for discounted tariff: Ja. As others have said, the mining farm is right next to the power plant so in a sense the farm is 'behind the meter' in that there is next to no transmission costs involved. Yes obviously the power plant is metering the farm, just separately from what is being sent out to 'The Grid'.

Now one might ask, "why would a utility give such a low rate to the farm"?.
Simple: Any power plant needs a stable base-line load to run at best efficiencies. Mining farms pulling 10's of MW are as stable of a load as it gets. Couple that with the power plant being in a region that is not heavily developed with heavy industries or cities near it (yet) and a rather long distance to The Grid's high tension lines it becomes simple economics with the Utility who is running the power plant making more money by supplying power to the farm vs selling it on The Grid.

Being a brand-new fully-fueled Nuclear plant and therefore immune to the fluctuating costs of natural gas/oil/coal and for the next decade or so, uranium, the Utility is able to provide TerraWulf that sweet 5-year power contract. A rare Win-Win for all parties involved!  

No matter how cheap Nuclear power gets I ain't investing a penny on it, the disadvantages of Nuclear power is what you don't want to experience, it's unforgiving and cruel, I will rather use wind power or power from the SUN, these two are safer and home-friendly, also if you are living in the U.S there is no need to pay the ridiculous percentage on Grid power since you won't be needing it.

But hydropower looks more attractive.

I mean as per the rate quoted in the article. It seems pretty cheap which means the operational costs could also be cheap but anyways i really don't know much about what it takes to set up a nuclear plant.

Maybe they are just given discounted tariffs as per an agreement.
...

Since its inception in 1948, the U.S. Navy nuclear program has developed 27 different plant designs, installed them in 210 nuclear-powered ships, taken 500 reactor cores into operation, and accumulated over 5,400 reactor years of operation and 128,000,000 miles safely steamed.

Interesting, I had no idea that Nuclear power is much cheaper at 2 cents per kilowatt-hour of power as compared to the U.S. industrial average of 9 cents/kWh or was this just as per the agreement with the nuclear company?

If Nuclear Energy is cheap, why aren't we seeing widespread use of it as compared to fossil fuel?

If Nuclear Energy is cheap, why aren't we seeing widespread use of it as compared to fossil fuel?

I mean as per the rate quoted in the article. It seems pretty cheap which means the operational costs could also be cheap but anyways i really don't know much about what it takes to set up a nuclear plant.

Maybe they are just given discounted tariffs as per an agreement.

Probably not in most countries, including mine. Even the industrial tariffs are just unbearable

I don't think that nuclear energy is cheap because waste disposal is very expensive.

But hydropower looks more attractive.

If Nuclear Energy is cheap, why aren't we seeing widespread use of it as compared to fossil fuel?

Interesting, I had no idea that Nuclear power is much cheaper at 2 cents per kilowatt-hour of power as compared to the U.S. industrial average of 9 cents/kWh or was this just as per the agreement with the nuclear company?

If Nuclear Energy is cheap, why aren't we seeing widespread use of it as compared to fossil fuel?