News JVTech In this country, Bitcoin replaces the sun and grows tulips
Published on 12/14/2022 at 6:20 p.m.
Due to its energy-intensive aspect, Bitcoin is attracting more and more the wrath of ecological associations. However, a collaboration between an engineer specializing in cryptocurrency and a flower grower has just created a bridge between crypto-miners and ecology.
Bitcoin Electricity Grows Tulips in the Netherlands
As Bitcoin gains interest, the cryptocurrency is singled out for its carbon footprint. Indeed, to collect BTC, miners invest in expensive hardware in the hope of mining new blocks on the Bitcoin network. By using machines such as servers filled with dozens of graphics cards in a permanent state, Bitcoin miners consume massive amounts of electricity.
This operating system called proof of work (PoW) is controversial. However, more and more projects are emerging with the aim of reusing the energy needed to mine Bitcoin.
In this sense, an initiative has recently emerged to use the energy of Bitcoin in the cultivation of flowers. This project is the result of a collaboration between a cryptocurrency engineer and a Tulip grower located in the Netherlands. If at first glance, the link between flowers and Bitcoin does not seem obvious, it is quite normal.
The calculations required to mine Bitcoin usually keep the machines running at full throttle. As a result, servers produce a lot of heat, just like a computer running a program.
Thus, engineer Bert de Groot tried an experiment that was innovative to say the least: placing six crypto mining servers in a greenhouse filled with rows of tulips. The heat generated by the mining equipment made it possible to heat the greenhouse without the use of auxiliary heating, generally necessary for cultivation.
In an even more eco-responsible logic, the “Bitcoin Brabant” company founded by Bert de Groot uses electricity from solar panels installed directly on the roof of the greenhouse. From then on, there is only water left to pay with the Bitcoins obtained through mining. Called “Bitcoin Bloem”, the interesting initiative reconciles part of the crypto sector with the ecological sphere.
In addition, then in full energy economy, the project also goes in the direction of the institutions since the mechanism makes it possible to do without gas, the price of which has skyrocketed since the conflict in Ukraine.
“We save natural gas and we earn bitcoins by generating them in the greenhouse,” the project’s flower grower, Danielle Koning, told AFP enthusiastically.
Experiments are multiplying in order to restore the image of the first cryptocurrency. As an example, this new project doesn’t remember the Tresorio water heater. Last October, this company presented a water heater that reused the heat produced by Bitcoin mining.
