El Salvador Mined Its First Bitcoin Using Volcanic Energy, Tweets President Nayib Bukele

El Salvador is the first country to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender alongside the US dollar.

By Edited by Gadgets 360 Newsdesk | Updated: 4 October 2021 14:39 IST

El Salvador Mined Its First Bitcoin Using Volcanic Energy, Tweets President Nayib Bukele

Volcanic energy could provide a renewable source of power for crypto mining

Highlights

El Salvador officially adopted Bitcoin as legal tender
El Salvador largely uses geothermal energy for domestic purposes
Iceland, Norway also use geothermal energy to mine cryptocurrency

El Salvador President Nayib Bukele has tweeted that his country has mined Bitcoin, the world's largest cryptocurrency, using energy from a volcano. He shared an image of the mining in progress, which showed 0.00599179 Bitcoin, worth about $284 (roughly Rs. 21,098) at the current trading rate. Last month, El Salvador became the first country in the world to give Bitcoin the status of a legal tender alongside the US dollar. The nationwide rollout, via its Chivo crypto wallet, had hit a bumpy road initially but the technical issues appear to have stabilised and the Central American country is moving ahead with its crypto experiment.

Nearly 25 percent of domestic energy production in El Salvador comes from geothermal energy. President Bukele tweeted on October 1 about El Salvador's maiden attempt to harness the energy of volcanoes to power Bitcoin mining.

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— Nayib Bukele ???????? (@nayibbukele) October 1, 2021

Indicating that the mining project was still a work in progress, the President tweeted, “We're still testing and installing, but this is officially the first Bitcoin mining from the volcanode.”

We're still testing and installing, but this is officially the first #Bitcoin mining from the #volcanode ????
— Nayib Bukele ???????? (@nayibbukele) October 1, 2021

However, this is not the first time energy from volcanoes has been used for mining Bitcoin. Previously, Iceland and Norway have used geothermal and hydroelectric energy to mine cryptocurrency. These countries take advantage of cheap energy sources to power their mining machines. The low temperatures in these countries also come as a benefit as they cool computer servers naturally.

In June, President Bukele had asked the state-owned geothermal electric company LaGeo to make efforts to ensure the power cost involved in Bitcoin mining is reduced.

I've just instructed the president of @LaGeoSV (our state-owned geothermal electric company), to put up a plan to offer facilities for #Bitcoin mining with very cheap, 100% clean, 100% renewable, 0 emissions energy from our volcanos ????

This is going to evolve fast! ???????? pic.twitter.com/1316DV4YwT
— Nayib Bukele ???????? (@nayibbukele) June 9, 2021

El Salvador is known for its volcanoes. Geothermal energy accounts for nearly a fourth of its domestic energy production. The latest move by the country is a welcome step in the direction of using renewable energy to mine cryptocurrency. It will also address some concerns about the carbon footprint of the cryptocurrency mining process.

Interested in cryptocurrency? We discuss all things crypto with WazirX CEO Nischal Shetty and WeekendInvesting founder Alok Jain on Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.

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