Tesla to power bitcoin mine with solar energy

Tesla solar panels and Megapack batteries are being deployed in Texas in order to mine bitcoin with 100 per cent renewable energy.The electric car maker partnered with payments firm Block and blockchain firm Blockstream to build a 3.8 megawatt (MW) facility that will begin operations later this year.Bitcoin mining – the process by which new units of the cryptocurrency are generated – has faced criticism in recent years for the vast amounts of electricity it requires.Estimates from the Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index suggest BTC mining uses as much energy as a country the size of Egypt, prompting climate activists to pressure the crypto industry to adopt new forms of mining that are less harmful to the environment.Several solutions have been proposed, including changing bitcoin’s underlying technology from ‘proof-of-work’ to ‘proof-of-stake’, though this…

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