Same Seneca Lake in Hunter's tattoo
Private Equity firm Atlas Holdings, operated by Greenidge Generation LLC
Powerplant at Seneca Lake, Finger Lakes, mines Bitcoins. Warms lake for profit
Some locals say a bitcoin mining operation is ruining one of the Finger Lakes. Here's how.
"The lake is so warm you feel like you're in a hot tub," said a woman who lives near a gas-fired New York plant that powers 8,000 computers mining bitcoins.
Summer on Seneca Lake, the largest of the Finger Lakes in upstate New York, is usually a time of boating, fishing, swimming and wine tasting. But for many residents of this bucolic region, there's a new activity this season — protesting a gas-fired power plant that they say is polluting the air and heating the lake.
"The lake is so warm you feel like you're in a hot tub," said Abi Buddington of Dresden, whose house is near the plant.
The facility on the shores of Seneca Lake is owned by the private equity firm Atlas Holdings and operated by Greenidge Generation LLC. They have increased the electrical power output at the gas-fired plant in the past year and a half and use much of the fossil-fuel energy not to keep the lights on in surrounding towns but for the energy-intensive "mining" of bitcoins.
Bitcoin is a cryptocurrency — a digital form of money with no actual bills or coins. "Mining" it, a way of earning it, requires massive high-performance computers. The computers earn small rewards of bitcoin by verifying transactions in the currency that occur on the internet around the world. The math required to verify the transactions and earn bitcoins gets more complex all the time and demands more and more computer power. At Greenidge, the computers operate 24/7, burning through an astounding amount of real energy, and producing real pollution, while collecting virtual currency.
An estimate from the University of Cambridge says global bitcoin miners use more energy in a year than Chile. When the energy comes from fossil fuels, the process can add significantly to carbon emissions. The Greenidge plant houses at least 8,000 computers and is looking to install more, meaning it will have to burn even more natural gas to produce more energy.
Private equity firms like Atlas buy companies, often using debt, and hope to sell them later at a profit. They are secretive operations with investments that can be hard to track. The number of such firms has grown significantly in recent years, and they oversee $5 trillion for pension funds, insurance companies, university endowments and wealthy people.
https://www.nbcnews.com/science/environment/some-locals-say-bitcoin-mining-operation-ruining-one-finger-lakes-n1272938
https://archive.is/ByenE