Inside the Bitcoin Mining Industry

 

Industry The mining industry has come a long way since the early days of graphics card mining. Today there are very professional industrial mining operations. Let’s take a look at how they work.

 

 

Mining farms look very similar to a data center. They contain rows of hardware with powerful fans to keep the miners from over heating.

Mining farms are typically very industrial looking – they aren’t flashy or sleek. Usually, its just a warehouse with great temperature control.

 

Bitcoin mining farms exclusively use ASIC miners to mine various coins. Many of these farms are minting several Bitcoins per day.

 

How much do crypto mining farms make?

 

How much a mining farm makes depends on many factors:

 

• The price it pays for electricity
  How old its mining hardware is
  The scale of its operation
  The price of Bitcoin when the miner sells it
  The level of difficulty when the Bitcoin is mined
  By far, the biggest factor affecting how much money a mining farm makes is how much it pays for electricity. Nearly all mining farms are using the same hardware.

 

Since the reward for finding a block is fixed, and the difficulty is adjusted based on total processing power working on finding blocks at any given time, then electricity is the only cost that is variable. If you can find cheaper power than other miners, you can afford to either increase the size of your mining operation, or spend less on your mining for the same output.

 

How much electricity do mining farms use?

 

As previously mentioned, mining farms use a lot of electricity. How much they consume depends on how big their operation is. However the latest Bitmain ASIC miner consumes about 1350 watts.

 

In total, it is estimated that all mining farms will use about 127 Terawatt hours of electricity in the year 2021. That is roughly the equivalent to the yearly energy consumption of Norway.

 

The main advantages of mining in China are faster setup times and lower initial CapEx which, along with closer proximity to where ASICs are assembled, have driven industry growth there.