On Thursday local reports from Mechanicville, the city located in Saratoga County, New York, say that an old hydroelectric plant constructed back in 1897 was almost dismantled, but today the plant is mining bitcoins. The Mechanicville facility is considered one of the oldest renewable energy plants in the world, and it’s now making “more money with bitcoin than selling the electricity” to the grid.
Historical Hydroelectric Machinery From 1897 Mines Bitcoin
In the historic district of Mechanicville, New York, there’s an 18.3-acre site that is considered one of the oldest renewable energy facilities in the world. Mechanicville Hydroelectric Plant was built in 1897 by the Hudson River Power Transmission Company and years ago the plant was almost shut down. The plant is now owned and operated by Albany Engineering Corp (AEC) and the company signed a deal with National Grid in order to have continued access to cheap renewable energy.
Jim Besha, AEC’s CEO, told local reporters that AEC is currently making 3X more money than it would be selling electricity to National Grid, the multinational electricity, and gas utility company. “We can actually make more money with bitcoin than selling the electricity to National Grid,” Besha remarked in a recent interview. The firm only makes $0.03 per kilowatt-hour (kWh) selling power to National Grid. Besha further said:
if (!window.GrowJs) { (function () { var s = document.createElement('script'); s.async = true; s.type = 'text/javascript';It’s the best (type of bitcoin mining) because we’re using renewable energy. We’re just doing it on the side, experimenting with it. We’re buying used servers.
