Topic: Bitcoin Mining Alternative Countries (Read 222 times)

Problem I see with Iceland is that country is small compared to China, Russia and United States and they are island isolated from all other countries.
They obviously can't create their own chips and asic miner transportation would no be cheap and easy.


Texas may be better option but they have isolated electric grid and I think they experienced some issue this year in the winter with blackouts.
Foundry USA is new Bitcoin mining pool that is now in top 10 mining pools but I think they are located in New York, and we need to see more pools like this.
This is one of the ways to compete with China instead of just complaining about them.

India is one of the most space-constrained countries with a hot tropical climate, unreliable electricity supplies (wherever it is cheap), and bad internet quotas compared to the needs of a mining setup. On top of that, unhealthy regulation ensures that it is almost criminal to have "mining hardware" cleared through the customs.

Hence, I hereby, officially revoke the nomination for India.

The best replacement is to do-away with all these industrial farms, democratize the prices and supplies of latest miners and let a million home miners around the world use their individual home electricity to mine it the way it was meant to be. One can dream.

China is indeed famous for its tenacity and hard work done in addition to the obvious support they get, but they do have the advantage that they are used to working seriously and are very reliable, as well as qualified facilities. no wonder they occupy number one and it is natural to carry it.

but I am also amazed that Vietnam as a Southeast Asian country is also quite reliable and for me it is quite surprising and very appreciative that they can be included in a decent scope.

Iceland is a good prospect. They've expanded into the server farm industry. Their cold climate reduces cooling costs. They're one of few nations to hold bankers accountable for their role in causing the 2008 economic crisis. They've also been crypto friendly for a long time through support for auroracoin and other native crypto ventures.

Texas is another good prospect. They've recently constructed massive wind farms which will produce large quantities of carbon neutral electricity. As US states go they pay relatively low taxes. Elon Musk and tesla reside in state and might be contracted to construct more megawatt grid tied lithium batteries which would further reduce the cost of electricity. Giving crypto miners in state a greater advantage.

China has one significant advanage in terms of them having large surplus semiconductor production. This makes it easier for them to design and rollout ASICS while saving on transport and start up costs. That's probably china's biggest advantage as far as mining goes. As well as the area least likely to be challenged.

Well, in the exercise of mining, the US already presents new options, China, due to the problems that it may present, have sought more options for mining, some have thought that even clean energy can be given, it is in several projects.

Already in the US it handles up to a hash of 10.10hash per second, which is 7.63% global:


Source: https://u.today/bitcoin-hashrate-moving-to-america-as-us-mining-pool-enters-top-five

Although in North America electricity costs are higher, they represent one of the best options.

So you are saying that China doesn't have corrupt dictatorial regimes and they didn't change their mind about bitcoin so many times?
I was thinking totally opposite and China is probably the role model for dictatorial censorship around the world.

Talking about alternative countries we also have to mention Nordic countries like Iceland, Sweden and Norway that have good climate,
they are using large percentage of renewable energy and they can surely increase number of Bitcoin mining farms operated there.
Price of electricity in Norway is around ~$0.105 kWh, Sweden ~$0.179 kWh and Iceland ~$0.140 kWh that is not much higher then price in China that have much smaller percentage of renewable energy.
Norway currently have only 0.48% share of Bitcoin mining and this could certainly increase in future if someone is smart enough to invest in this.

Electricity costs are an important factor,but there are many other factors.
Countries like Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, India, and Russia aren't very friendly to the foreign investors and the issues of registering and running a company in such countries have to be included in your calculations.Most of those countries have corrupt dictatorial regimes,that aren't very Bitcoin friendly,or they might change their view towards Bitcoin from positive/neutral to negative pretty fast.
This means that every BTC miner might lose everything,if he decides to build mining facilities in such countries.

Not all Asic miners are manufactured in China, and I said that countries surrounding China have nice advantage of cross border trading and they have cheaper electricity.
Chinese miners are probably cheapest but manufacturers from other countries may have other advantages like better warranty, better service and faster shipping to other countries in western world.

If we take a look at list of active Bitcoin asic miners manufacturers, there are around 30 of them according to several sources but Bitmain, MicroBT and Canaan are biggest one and they have most efficient and profitable miners like Bitmain Antminer S19, MicroBT Whatsminer M30S and Canaan AvalonMiner 1246.
There are also vendors and resellers that sell miners directly in Russia, Netherlands, Austria, France and other countries.

List of currently active Asic miners mostly manufactured in China, but few of them are made in United Kigdom, United States, Sweden and Isreal:

- 21
- ASICMiner
- ASICrising
- BIOSTAR
- Baikal
- Bitfily
- BitDragonfly
- BitFury (United Kingdom)
- Bitmain
- Black Arrow
- Btc-Digger
- BTCGARDEN
- Butterfly Labs
- Canaan Avalon Project
- Clam
- CoinTerra
- DigBig
- Ebang
- FusionSilicon
- Gridchip
- Gridseed
- Goldshell
- HashFast Technologies
- iBeLink (United States)
- iCoinTech
- Innosilicon
- KnCMiner Sweden AB
- Land Asic
- LK Group
- MegaBigPower
- MicroBT
- Obelisk (United States)
- PandaMiner
- SFARDS
- Spondoolies (Israel)
- StrongU
- TMR
- Todek

Sources:
- https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/List_of_Bitcoin_mining_ASICs
- https://www.asicminervalue.com/manufacturers

90% or more of the capital costs come from the purchase of mining rigs. The cooling systems are not very expensive and they don't need to be imported from China. The problem in setting up mining farms in cold countries such as Canada and Iceland is that the mining rigs still needs to be imported from China. And the price of a medium-sized rig which costs $500 in China may shoot up to $1,500 per piece once it reaches Canada or Iceland, thanks to the shipping charges and import duty.

Constant power supply happens to be one of the key prerequisite for bitcoin minning. Considering the ban of Cryptominning which is an outplay of some religious misconception about Cryptocurrencies. So many religions were against Cryptocurrency mining not until this era where Crypto has gained full influence across nations.

I strongly believe most of this laws passed against the mining of Crypto currency in various nations will be amended because most of the law makers are investing heavily on Crypto currencies so therefore maintaining policies that would be a hindrance to their investment would have to be amended

News recently said China has no longer prohibit the use of Bitcoin. This country has noticed Bitcoin as a feasible property. China is the most bitcoin buyer, so this will promote bitcoin exploitation in the world. At the same time affect the value of Bitcoin. The future Bitcoin has the ability to dominate the currency world.

If you are in a mostly cold climate country, I think that you can profit a lot in those places, Canada or any places that have snows all year round is pretty good because you have less cost with heating. Isn't mining bitcoin in China prohibited or only state owned? I am confused because China bans bitcoin use for their citizens while they are also part of the growth of bitcoin.

@dkbit98
Interesting results for the first chart but I think it would've been better if you compared the one that was meant for businesses as opposed to households...
^{- Having said that, I do know for a fact that there are few countries from that list that even charge a higher rate for mining operations in comparison to the one they usually give for businesses.}

I would love to see that happen but @bryant.coleman has valid points...
^{- It'd be nice to see new manufacturers from countries that are on top of that list.}

Capital costs represent around half of the total expenses in the long term and this is where China has the advantage. The mining rigs are produced in China and therefore they are available at very low prices. If you import the mining rigs to a country such as India or Indonesia, the shipping charges and import duty will make it at least 100% more expensive. Electricity is not very cheap in China, but nowadays mining rigs have become more electricity efficient and their power consumption has gone down. Apart from China, it is very difficult to set up a profitable Bitcoin mining operation in any other part of the world.

If we look at current state of Bitcoin hashrate and mining pools we can see that many of mining pools are located in China for several reasons:

- Low price of electricity in China (~$0.083 kWh)
- Large supply of mining equipment
- Favorable climate

China recently faced one of the biggest power blackouts in a decade and authorities are thinking of introducing restrictions to save energy, that may affect Bitcoin mining pools.
China is also country with most renewable energy capacity according to Statista research and one of the biggest region Sichuan is getting electricity from many of their hydroelectric dams.

Now let's take a look at countries that have lower electricity prices than China, and we are going to exclude Venezuela and few other countries that are known for unreliable electricity network that often has restrictions.
We can also exclude countries like Egypt because it's illegal to mine Bitcoin there and there is high risk of losing your mining equipment.
Some countries have unfavorable climate and hot weather but price is much lower than in China.


https://www.globalpetrolprices.com/electricity_prices/

Biggest candidates for me are countries surrounding China, that have lot of land space like Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, India, and Russia.
They can get asic miners quickly and they can have similar weather conditions like China but with cheaper electricity prices.
It is interesting to see that Kyrgyzstan electricity prices (~$0.010 kWh) are 6 times cheaper than in China, and Uzbekistan (~$0.026 kWh) have 4 times cheaper electricity.

Other interesting region is South America with big countries like Argentina that have ~$0.063 kWh average electricity price, and Canadian company Bitfarms is planning to make mining facility there for several reasons,
climate is favorable all year round, and they have special contract for even cheaper electricity for fist four years of mining.
Other countries in South America could also be interesting but one disadvantage I see there is distance and shipment of asic miners.

I think it's time to change this stats and explore other countries for Bitcoin mining.


https://cbeci.org/mining_map