El Salvador to use volcanic energy for cryptocurrency mining

El Salvador President Nayib Bukele has gone through with his promise to use the power of active volcanoes  to mine cryptocurrencies. In a tweet published last Wednesday, September 29, Bukele shared a 25-second video that showed the current progress of creating a mining facility around an active volcanic site. 

The video currently has 2.2 million views and counting. Bukele also captioned it with the simple words ‘First steps’, and a hashtag to promote #Bitcoin along with emojis of a volcano, the El Salvador flag and Bitcoin. 

Some parts of the video showed several buildings in a remote area, with a plume of smoke coming out in the middle. Other shots included the high-powered computers being plugged in and large trucks bringing in equipment. It was meant to be a teaser of a possible string of announcements in the coming weeks. 

El Salvador sits right on the edge of the Ring of Fire in the Pacific Ocean along with many other countries. There are over 20 active volcanoes in the country, and there is currently no word as to how the President will decide to use the power of the rest of these volcanoes. 

Back in June of 2021, the government in El Salvador sought the assistance of an electrical company named LaGeo to make the initiative happen. The idea was to mine Bitcoin safely without harming the environment and using massive amounts of energy. 

Experts are saying that using geothermal energy from a volcano could be a huge step in the process of mining crypto. Lately, Bitcoin is receiving criticism for consuming massive amounts of energy just to add new coins in circulation.

To successfully mine cryptocurrencies, a series of difficult mathematical problems need to be solved through the use of computers. Afterwards, miners will be rewarded for solving these problems with cryptocurrency. 

In early September of this year El Salvador officially became the first country to declare Bitcoin as legal tender. The rollout for the past month has experienced some challenges, but more developments are being made as the weeks pass. 

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