Thanks to industry-leading hardware and software, we turned cow manure on a large agricultural farm into bitcoin mined with biogas and useful heat. The water cooling mining solutions paired with advanced custom firmware features such as Autotuning and Dynamic Performance Scaling, makes for an awesome stranded energy heat reuse project.

Biogas energy generation - animal excrements to flammable gas

For centuries, humans have eaten beef. It provides us with protein, plus it tastes good and can be prepared in a variety of ways. Cows provide us with more than just beef, too – they produce milk, and they produce fertilizer.

Cows eat a lot, so naturally, they poop a lot – over 25 lbs per day. Their poop has been reused to grow crops for centuries too, but their poop can create more than just crops.

It can create bitcoin.

Cow manure can be converted into a flammable gas, which then can fuel combustion engines, allowing you to mine bitcoin. This is much more common than you’d think. Braiins actually tests our firmware, Braiins OS, at a farm that does this. Part of our competitive edge is thanks to cow poop.

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This works through gasification processes like grinding, fermenting, and filtering – all to transfer the manure into flammable gas.

Biogas energy generation is complex, but it helps you make the most out of your surroundings to produce electricity, which can then be used for a variety of cool purposes.

Water-cooled bitcoin mining machines

Like we have discussed, there are multiple ways to cool your ASICs – if you don’t cool them, they will overheat and burn out. It is imperative to have proper cooling systems in place. Hydro cooling is one popular method that sends cold water directly to each bitcoin miner. The water then comes out hot, gets cooled again, then gets sent back to the miner – the cycle constantly continues.

You can also use water-cooled bitcoin miners for heat reuse. There is specialized hardware that makes the process much easier.

In our proof of concept experiment we used the Bitmain Antrack V1. It can hold five S19 XP Hyd. miners and produces just over 1 Petahash per second worth of mining power. The setup involves hydro cooling, where cold water is sent directly to each miner to cool them.

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When the water comes out, however, it is hot. With the Antrack, it has self-contained cooling tech featuring a closed water loop and dry cooler. This makes the cooling process much simpler, as you can then reuse the water constantly. Still, you have the option to reuse it. You can redirect that water to something with a completely different purpose – like a hot tub.

Hardware like the Bitmain Antrack will help us rethink how bitcoin, energy, and heating work in conjunction with each other. Software is crucial to a successful bitcoin mining operation, too.

Custom firmware increases mining profitability

Thanks to Braiins OS, the Antrack V1 with five S19 XP Hyd. units sees roughly 5% better efficiency per unit – which equates to an additional 50 TH/s. Our Autotuning feature is key here.

Each bitcoin miner has over 300 individual chips. Not all chips are created equal – some are more powerful than others. Autotuning identifies the most and least powerful chips in each bitcoin miner. The weaker chips are asked to do less work, and the stronger chips do more work. This gives miners a stronger output at the same power limit. Bitcoin miners can get the most out of their ASICs thanks to Autotuning.

Braiins OS has another key feature too – Dynamic Performance Scaling. DPS allows users to pre-set the chip temperature output limit, which is great for heat management. Whenever a miner reaches that temperature limit, DPS automatically scales down the miner into low power mode until the temperature regulates itself. 

This helps keep units online during the hot summer months – and all miners know that maximum uptime produces maximum profitability. This temperature regulation also extends the lifetime of bitcoin mining machines. DPS is an awesome tool for bitcoin mining heat reuse, because the best heat is consistent heat.

The Future of Heat Reuse

Humans love heat. Over 25% of the world’s energy is used for comfort heating. When you use electricity for comfort heating, it is simply a sunk cost that you’ll never get back. Bitcoin miners, on the other hand, are amazing options for heaters. Every watt used to power a bitcoin miner can be directly converted into heat. So, people should bitcoin miners for their heat to find new revenue streams that otherwise would be lost.

As we mentioned in the video, there are so many uses for heat. The best bitcoin mining hardware and software will continue to lead the way in expanding the way we think about bitcoin, energy, and heat.

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