Bitcoin mining operation in Finger Lakes sparks local concerns

It is a slippery slope when we have any group questioning the value to the community of another group that legally purchased the electricity. Once that becomes OK the next domino is that there are air breathers that dont add any value to the community and their air should be stopped. Crypto smears are being perpetuated by groups that can manipulate current monetary scheme. They wish to stamp out ones they cannot by whatever means possible.
True. And there should be more slippery slopes everywhere. Perhaps everyone will stay within their natural bounds.
 
It is a slippery slope when we have any group questioning the value to the community of another group that legally purchased the electricity.
Sounds like an argument of "If you can afford it, you should be able to do whatever you want with it" . IMO the slippery slope is to use that mentality and apply to everything. If a guy wants to put a billion Christmas lights on his house, does a community as a whole not have a right to say "Wait a minute there...", if a venture capitalist wants to buy up the entire supply Epipens so they can jack up the price on them the community is supposed to just nod it's head and say "welp that's capitalism for you!", if someone buys a super car they should be allowed to use it to it's fullest and go 200 MPH because they can afford it. Now sure you might argue that there are laws that supersede some "wants", but isn't that what this effectively is? The community deciding to make a "law" about something to 'improve' the community as a whole. Yeah, I really don't see this as a slippery slope at all.
 
I'm no EE or Civil Engineer, but they bought a plant, and somehow it powers ONLY one purpose? Or is it putting out a specific output, and one of their other facilities they own, happen to use that equivalnet or greater amount? I don't know of many power plants connected to a single structure or complex. One of the biggest datacenter providers in the Vegas region has a HUGE solar farm, and it connects to the grid, not directly to their facilities. So they essentially offset their grid usage.
 
The story as read indicates to me the people don't have a clue what they are protesting about. Plant is Carbon neutral, if that is true those folks protesting released more Carbon into the atmosphere than the mining. The mining operation is done by the buyer of the plant that converted a coal plant (very Carbon polluting) to Natural gas, seems like he should get a community reward for that. Employs dozens of folks, ecological survey indicates no adverse effect of the area. Anyways folks thinking they can just dictate, regardless of facts what you or I can do when we are actually doing no harm is sad. Plus utterly senseless, apparently brainwashed people, having no clue about CO2, benefits, pitfalls etc. basic cycle, maybe brain dead is a better term.
 
The story as read indicates to me the people don't have a clue what they are protesting about. Plant is Carbon neutral, if that is true those folks protesting released more Carbon into the atmosphere than the mining. The mining operation is done by the buyer of the plant that converted a coal plant (very Carbon polluting) to Natural gas, seems like he should get a community reward for that. Employs dozens of folks, ecological survey indicates no adverse effect of the area. Anyways folks thinking they can just dictate, regardless of facts what you or I can do when we are actually doing no harm is sad. Plus utterly senseless, apparently brainwashed people, having no clue about CO2, benefits, pitfalls etc. basic cycle, maybe brain dead is a better term.
There is no "people" and there is no protest.. It's a local busybody in a small town with a gmail and tumbleweeds twitter account that farmed a few hundred followers by spamming follow.

The business model is you register a nonprofit and pretend to crusade for 'environmental causes', elicit donations, pay yourself a salary, etc. And since Bitcoin mining is the big buzzword of the moment, you definitely latch on to that.

Eventually you make it big and upgrade from operating out of a free gmail account, to paying the $12/year for a custom email domain - but that's only when you really hit it big. I have faith "Seneca Lake Guardian" will get there some day.
 
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There is no "people" and there is no protest.. It's a couple local busybodies in a small town that have a gmail and a tumbleweeds twitter account.

He should just sell each one of them an RTX 3090 at MSRP. All would be forgotten.
 
The story as read indicates to me the people don't have a clue what they are protesting about. Plant is Carbon neutral, if that is true those folks protesting released more Carbon into the atmosphere than the mining. The mining operation is done by the buyer of the plant that converted a coal plant (very Carbon polluting) to Natural gas, seems like he should get a community reward for that. Employs dozens of folks, ecological survey indicates no adverse effect of the area. Anyways folks thinking they can just dictate, regardless of facts what you or I can do when we are actually doing no harm is sad. Plus utterly senseless, apparently brainwashed people, having no clue about CO2, benefits, pitfalls etc. basic cycle, maybe brain dead is a better term.
They're going after natural gas, too. I've heard reports on how several states want to ban gas-powered stoves and even ban gas-powered heating systems. Would need to take that into Soapbox since going further into that conversation will inevitably get political.
 
They're going after natural gas, too. I've heard reports on how several states want to ban gas-powered stoves and even ban gas-powered heating systems. Would need to take that into Soapbox since going further into that conversation will inevitably get political.

Lol, imagine living in Minnesota or someplace similar where the solar is nearly useless in the winter and heating your home with electricity instead of natural gas. Not only is it incredibly inefficient by comparison, but you would be paying thousands of dollars per month just to heat a small home which would probably be using natural gas at a powerplant anyways.
 
Natural gas is easily the least polluting carbon fuel you can burn. Coupled with the fact that it is plentiful and found right in the region with the Marcellus Shale, so you aren't even running pipelines all the way across the country to feed it. You should do more research about it.

That doesn’t make it carbon neutral.
 
^^ especially useful when the opinions are so blatantly uninformed

Do these folks know there are datacenters all over new York and New Jersey that are also not environmentally friendly. The data centers in that area, they service mostly stock exchanges... Speculation and plenty of criminal enterprise going on there

Datacenters for stock markets and world banking are literally essential for the economy. What is a Bitcoin mining farm essential for?
 
The only thing they will truly care about, the NYS Government, is whether Cuomo gets his cut.
 
Sounds like an argument of "If you can afford it, you should be able to do whatever you want with it" . IMO the slippery slope is to use that mentality and apply to everything. If a guy wants to put a billion Christmas lights on his house, does a community as a whole not have a right to say "Wait a minute there...", if a venture capitalist wants to buy up the entire supply Epipens so they can jack up the price on them the community is supposed to just nod it's head and say "welp that's capitalism for you!", if someone buys a super car they should be allowed to use it to it's fullest and go 200 MPH because they can afford it. Now sure you might argue that there are laws that supersede some "wants", but isn't that what this effectively is? The community deciding to make a "law" about something to 'improve' the community as a whole. Yeah, I really don't see this as a slippery slope at all.
Christ, these laws already exist. Has no one heard of city ordances restricting things like noise, fence height, school speed zones, etc. Or zoning laws restricting where commercial businesses are built. How about Home Owner Association regulations?
 
The story as read indicates to me the people don't have a clue what they are protesting about. Plant is Carbon neutral, if that is true those folks protesting released more Carbon into the atmosphere than the mining.
Lets be clear, the PLANT is not carbon neutral, all they did is buy some "carbon credits" to offset what they put out. Referring to that as something that as "carbon neutral" is quite silly. Funny too that I'm sure some of the same people who laugh at the idea of carbon credits may be championing this as a "carbon neutral plant.
 
Read the article.

“Buying carbon credits” doesn’t magically make something carbon neutral for a multitude of reasons, chief among them being that it’s difficult to calculate the carbon reduction of funded programs compared to emissions, as well as the well documented abuse of carbon credit programs. The only way to reduce carbon output is to reduce unnecessary energy use.
 
For a niche currency that isn’t necessary for international commerce? Sorry, digital gold. Sorry, store of value. Also, don’t use it as a currency, just HODL. Absolutely necessary energy use going on here.
You mean like settling transactions between financial institutions? You could run that on a relative toaster

High frequency trading, algorithmic trading with AI, these things you need major datacenters for, things that were invented purely to make money
 
You mean like settling transactions between financial institutions? You could run that on a relative toaster

High frequency trading, algorithmic trading with AI, these things you need major datacenters for, things that were invented purely to make money
The HFT and algorithmic trading stuff is an unnecessary side problem, but your whataboutism is noted, there are other problems in the world that can be addressed besides just the crypto-token problem. Pointing out other problems in the world isn't a defense of your problem. The existence of other yet to be addressed problems isn't a reason to avoid addressing yours.
 
How much electricity goes to waste powering consoles and gaming pc's?
If you all would read a book instead, mother earth would begin to heal....

Sounds stupid, Doesn't it? But it makes perfect sense to other people out there.
 
Lol, imagine living in Minnesota or someplace similar where the solar is nearly useless in the winter and heating your home with electricity instead of natural gas. Not only is it incredibly inefficient by comparison, but you would be paying thousands of dollars per month just to heat a small home which would probably be using natural gas at a powerplant anyways.
People in REALLY cold climates like Minnesota, Wisconsin, etc often use heating oil (aka pink diesel) or burn solids like corn stock, etc. Not to say Natural gas isn't used. That being said, when you get into the lower midwest and down into Texas, etc natural gas for heat is very useful. It offset a lot of power usage during our SNOVID in February down here in Texas. Folks like me that had natural gas used a fraction of the power of those with resistive heat.
 
People in REALLY cold climates like Minnesota, Wisconsin, etc often use heating oil (aka pink diesel) or burn solids like corn stock, etc. Not to say Natural gas isn't used. That being said, when you get into the lower midwest and down into Texas, etc natural gas for heat is very useful. It offset a lot of power usage during our SNOVID in February down here in Texas. Folks like me that had natural gas used a fraction of the power of those with resistive heat.
Propane is more common in rural WI. Pretty much every house without access to natural gas has a gigantic rented propane tank on their property.
 
Called it.
Pretty much. Especially since energy consumption is a problem that is quite easy to solve with prices. If someone is willing to pay for the usage of something, why do you care so much? Plus, if energy prices rise, that just gives more incentive for people to invest in renewables like solar.
 
People in REALLY cold climates like Minnesota, Wisconsin, etc often use heating oil (aka pink diesel) or burn solids like corn stock, etc. Not to say Natural gas isn't used. That being said, when you get into the lower midwest and down into Texas, etc natural gas for heat is very useful. It offset a lot of power usage during our SNOVID in February down here in Texas. Folks like me that had natural gas used a fraction of the power of those with resistive heat.
Every house in a town/city up here has natural gas running to it just like with electricity and water. Houses out in the country have huge LPG tanks that get refilled every year or so, although some people in cities also use that so they can buy fuel from whoever they like at a price they like instead of the utility company. I've never heard of anyone using heating oil or corn stock. But I know someone with a wood burning furnace (that can also be switched to LPG).
 
Pretty much. Especially since energy consumption is a problem that is quite easy to solve with prices. If someone is willing to pay for the usage of something, why do you care so much? Plus, if energy prices rise, that just gives more incentive for people to invest in renewables like solar.

Sure sure will just dump excessive cost of electricity on the retired with fixed incomes and force them to upgrade to solar on their roofs for thousands of dollars. I am sure grandparents the disabled and others dont mind going broke or not being able to afford power so you can make 1 dollar a day in bitcoin.
 
Sure sure will just dump excessive cost of electricity on the retired with fixed incomes and force them to upgrade to solar on their roofs for thousands of dollars. I am sure grandparents the disabled and others dont mind going broke or not being able to afford power so you can make 1 dollar a day in bitcoin.
Now you see how capitalism works. And besides, energy prices are far from prohibitive for even for the poor. Simple fact is an increase in energy prices encourages innovation.
 
Lets be clear, the PLANT is not carbon neutral, all they did is buy some "carbon credits" to offset what they put out. Referring to that as something that as "carbon neutral" is quite silly. Funny too that I'm sure some of the same people who laugh at the idea of carbon credits may be championing this as a "carbon neutral plant.
Oh dear, your right, the folks that work there breath and thus emit CO2. Also obviously to your point, Carbon credits are BS and just a means to take money away to those who did absolutely nothing in producing, creating, making, employing etc. Yes natural gas has about 30% less CO2 as compared to oil and less than 45% compared to coal burning per BTU. Carbon Credits is an imaginary way of saying something is Carbon neutral when it is not.
 
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Now you see how capitalism works. And besides, energy prices are far from prohibitive for even for the poor. Simple fact is an increase in energy prices encourages innovation.

Oh you want to see capitalism, go pass x amount of energy and we charge you 4x the normal price. More then 1 way to spin things. You need to innovate a way to mine bitcoin with less power now.
 
Oh you want to see capitalism, go pass x amount of energy and we charge you 4x the normal price. More then 1 way to spin things. You need to innovate a way to mine bitcoin with less power now.
So who is putting together the committee that determines acceptable uses of energy? That's where you run into problems. Also, the fact that the energy companies are private entities as well.
 
So who is putting together the committee that determines acceptable uses of energy? That's where you run into problems. Also, the fact that the energy companies are private entities as well.
Most energy prices are regulated by the government and CA where I live does punish heavy users with the consent of the government and the power companies are private entities and public. I have even seen draft proposals to allow much higher rates on homes that use excessive amounts of energy. After all someone is going to have to pay for the grid updates needed to handle all those electric cars the current administration wants.
 
Most energy prices are regulated by the government and CA where I live does punish heavy users with the consent of the government and the power companies are private entities and public. I have even seen draft proposals to allow much higher rates on homes that use excessive amounts of energy. After all someone is going to have to pay for the grid updates needed to handle all those electric cars the current administration wants.
Actually the punishment is not for "excessive amounts" their tiers of usage are actually based on roughly 50% average use. So if everyone used the same amount, then everyone would be into the next tier of payment. Now they are forcibly moving everyone into time of use programs because solar doesn't provide much in the 4 to 9pm and they are expecting people to change their use habits like oh hey just got home from work, I'm going to do absolutely nothing until 9pm, no tv, computer, heating of food, nothing. Plus they also pay solar producers less because when they make most of their power is now considered off peak rates. It has very little to do with curbing usage and everything to so with making more money, a government backed extortion racket
 
I don't understand crypto, but the real problem is IMHO generating power and we're a bit too focused on the wrong end of the issue.

Even if materials science and electronics manage to continue the trend of lowering power consumption of various devices we'll run out of coal and space for wind farms and solar farms. Water issues might follow.

My opinion is we desperately need more reactors and to mitigate any bottlenecks slowing down the development of ITER (although that is the long shot). Also better solar cells (perovskite and graphene, thermophotovoltaics).
 
Oh you want to see capitalism, go pass x amount of energy and we charge you 4x the normal price. More then 1 way to spin things. You need to innovate a way to mine bitcoin with less power now.

Innovation is cool and all, but it's not as effective as bribery and blackmail.
 
Setting the carbon issue aside for a minute, the article states that there is a significant increase in the temperature of the lake. To quote: "The lake is so warm you feel like you’re in a hot tub,"

And I did check multiple sources on this. What it means is that the lake doesn't have the capacity to handle the heat output of the power plant.

You guys can't honestly tell me that a large increase in lake temperature is good for the wildlife in that lake or the overall lake ecology.
 
Setting the carbon issue aside for a minute, the article states that there is a significant increase in the temperature of the lake. To quote: "The lake is so warm you feel like you’re in a hot tub,"

And I did check multiple sources on this. What it means is that the lake doesn't have the capacity to handle the heat output of the power plant.

You guys can't honestly tell me that a large increase in lake temperature is good for the wildlife in that lake or the overall lake ecology.

No but it's great for hot tubs!! imagine how many people could fit in there at once. The life giving ecology that's been developing for thousands of years can always find somewhere else. Won't you think of all the people who require another needless form of temporary amusement?

hand rubbing intensifies...
 
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Setting the carbon issue aside for a minute, the article states that there is a significant increase in the temperature of the lake. To quote: "The lake is so warm you feel like you’re in a hot tub,"

And I did check multiple sources on this. What it means is that the lake doesn't have the capacity to handle the heat output of the power plant.

You guys can't honestly tell me that a large increase in lake temperature is good for the wildlife in that lake or the overall lake ecology.
No a large increase in lake temperature is not good, however first one needs to check on multiple sources and determine if in fact the lake has increased in temperature or is the person doing what most people do and just making shit up when trying to argue a point.
 
Thank you for doing your part in helping ensure the government steps in and starts looking at regulating how much energy usage a single entity actually needs.
Fortunately this will not be allowed until the comunist party of america is in power.
 
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