thecoinrepublic.com
Things are not looking good for bitcoin (BTC) miners in Venezuela as regional authorities of the country have suspended the power supply to these miners. This is even though the majority of them are registered BTC miners.
On August 7, regional authorities of the Carabobo state in Venezuela cut off the electricity service to the entirety of bitcoin and other cryptocurrency miners in that said territory. An official statement as to why they did it has yet to be released, though it is believed that such a move was due to the massive amount of electricity these mining rigs are gobbling up.
Another probable reason is for the authorities to pressure other crypto miners who opted to operate underground. Also, speculations are suggesting that the suspension of power happened was due to the internal elections within the country’s ruling party – Partido Socialista Unido de Venezuela (PSUV) which took place the following day. The political event will decide who will be the representatives of the party for the upcoming gubernatorial elections.
As of late, there’s been an ongoing power contingency within Venezuela. With that in mind, these two agencies – the National Electricity Corporation (CORPOELEC) and the National Cryptocurrency Superintendency (SUNACRIP) are planning to meet up for them to address and assess the current situation.
Venezuela’s ruling party theory
The above-mentioned speculation regarding PSUV having influenced the decision to suspend bitcoin and crypto mining in the key state to minimize energy consumption and prevent power fluctuations remains speculation. As stated, the organizations involved remained mum on this until they finally met with authorities behind the power interruption.
Bitcoin/crypto mining museum in the capital
A few weeks before this, a private firm known as Criptovila built the Museum of Bitcoin mining History in Venezuela. The said collective of crypto miners aims to introduce people to the world of bitcoin/crypto mining. The museum is situated in the Venezuelan capital of Caracas and will open to the masses with entrance free of charge.
A member of Criptovila – Joan Telo said, “We decided to take this step because, until now, there is no, or at least not publicly, place where people can observe evolution and we felt it was necessary.”
The museum will exhibit the evolution of bitcoin mining from its central processing unit (CPU) days, to its graphics processing unit GPU methods, and eventually the current application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC)/integrated circuit (IC).
Additional mining trends will be introduced to the museum as they arise as Telo stated that their idea is to add equipment to the museum as they acquire them adding that they want to be a world reference on this topic of the evolutionary process of cryptocurrency mining.
Bitcoin helping Venezuelans survive
For the uninitiated, Venezuela’s so-called hyperinflation is so bad that their money’s worth is likely to be halved within just a week after they’ve earned it. One of the things Venezuelans resorted to to preserve the value of their hard-earned bolivar (country’s official currency) is through bitcoin since one of its features is its store of value.