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El Salvador’s President: ‘First Steps’ Being Made to Power Bitcoin Mining With Volcanic Energy

source-logo  coindesk.com 29 September 2021 11:56, UTC

El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele said that the Central American country is taking the “first steps” to develop volcanic energy for bitcoin mining.

In a tweet posted on Tuesday, Bukele uploaded a short video showing images of work being done by state-owned geothermal electric company, LaGeo, to power mining machines. The video showed workers connecting mining rigs and a large black shipping container bearing the inscription “Government of El Salvador” being delivered.

In June, after approving a bill to make bitcoin legal tender in the Central American nation, Bukele said he had directed LaGeo to allow power-hungry bitcoin miners to plug into the country’s volcanic resources.

“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,” Bukele tweeted at that time.

The idea was born in a Twitter Spaces session Bukele shared with bitcoin gadfly Nic Carter in June. It was based on the fact that El Salvador has hundreds of megawatts of untapped geothermal potential, as well as a network of underutilized power plants that could be plugged into.

In September, bitcoin became legal tender in El Salvador, three months after the Bitcoin Law passed the country’s legislature.

Read more: El Salvador Is Botching Its Bitcoin Experiment

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coindesk.com