Central Washington: epicenter of world-changing technology or ground zero for Bitcoin's epic fail
Posted: Sun Apr 15, 2018 2:27 pm
I thought this was quite interesting from our local Inlander that comes out where I live. I'm having to post it in sections because my iPad keeps logging me out over and over. Kind of frustrating, but I will persevere.
Central Washington: epicenter of world-changing technology or ground zero for Bitcoin's epic fail
By Samantha Wohlfeil
Mining hardware at Malachi Salcido's Columbia Data Center.
In a gray warehouse tucked behind a tavern off one of the main drags in downtown Wenatchee, Malachi Salcido gets settled in his office, where a wall of computer monitors allows him to split his attention between live feeds of construction sites, photos of his family and websites tracking the real-time value of cryptocurrencies and their exchanges.
He's a master electrician, certified public accountant and owner of a successful design-build construction business. But it's his latest venture — "mining" for Bitcoin — that has people cold calling him, with some flying straight from China or Japan to knock at the door in hopes of grabbing a few minutes of his time.
A mile down the road from his office, in a converted cold-storage warehouse, 1,800 machines with incredible computing power work 24 hours a day at Salcido's Columbia Data Center solving complicated algorithms to earn the digital currency. At the same time, as Salcido watches on the live feed in his office, crews across the river in East Wenatchee are building a new mining facility for him that's five times that size.
With even more sites in the works, the founder and CEO of Salcido Enterprises aims to make his firm the biggest player in Bitcoin and blockchain technology in the country, and, unfortunately for the cold callers, he's not about to build operations for other people.
"You can't hire us to design your facility, to maintain your facility, you can't buy our facility, we don't do it for anyone else," he says. "But it's nuts how many want us to do this for them here in this region."
The "mining" process requires huge amounts of electricity. After the value of Bitcoin spiked above $19,000 in December, the cryptocurrency world turned its attention to Central Washington, which has the cheapest electricity in the entire country thanks to dams along the Columbia River and other bodies of water.
For months, public utility districts (or PUDs) throughout the state have been hounded with requests for power at unprecedented levels: People are asking for 20, 50, 100 megawatts of electricity, with one caller even asking the Pend Oreille County PUD where they could get 2 gigawatts — enough to power more than 1 million homes.
In response to this modern gold rush, many cities and utilities are pumping the brakes as they decide if and how to build out their infrastructure for an industry many people still don't understand and that experts warn could totally collapse. Since mid-February, a wave of Central Washington cities and utilities passed temporary bans or limitations on the operations.
"This is Bitcoin: Wild West 2.0," Salcido says.
For the record, Salcido thinks the moratoriums and interim controls on new digital mining are a good thing: He went through a similar years-long moratorium process with local agencies after he first got in the game in 2013.
And he understands people's skepticism: What if this technology doesn't get adopted? What's the point? After first learning about Bitcoin, Salcido says he saw it going one of two ways.
"This tech will either become nothing — Furby dolls, pet rocks, Betamax — OK? Or it's going to disrupt every industry I can think of, and probably some I can't," Salcido says. "It's either a major market disruptor and major market creator, or it's nothing. It's one of those two. It won't be a niche technology."
He's banking on it changing the world.
Malachi Salcido, founder and CEO of Salcido Enterprises, believes blockchain technology will change how everyone shares data.
Central Washington: epicenter of world-changing technology or ground zero for Bitcoin's epic fail
By Samantha Wohlfeil
Mining hardware at Malachi Salcido's Columbia Data Center.
In a gray warehouse tucked behind a tavern off one of the main drags in downtown Wenatchee, Malachi Salcido gets settled in his office, where a wall of computer monitors allows him to split his attention between live feeds of construction sites, photos of his family and websites tracking the real-time value of cryptocurrencies and their exchanges.
He's a master electrician, certified public accountant and owner of a successful design-build construction business. But it's his latest venture — "mining" for Bitcoin — that has people cold calling him, with some flying straight from China or Japan to knock at the door in hopes of grabbing a few minutes of his time.
A mile down the road from his office, in a converted cold-storage warehouse, 1,800 machines with incredible computing power work 24 hours a day at Salcido's Columbia Data Center solving complicated algorithms to earn the digital currency. At the same time, as Salcido watches on the live feed in his office, crews across the river in East Wenatchee are building a new mining facility for him that's five times that size.
With even more sites in the works, the founder and CEO of Salcido Enterprises aims to make his firm the biggest player in Bitcoin and blockchain technology in the country, and, unfortunately for the cold callers, he's not about to build operations for other people.
"You can't hire us to design your facility, to maintain your facility, you can't buy our facility, we don't do it for anyone else," he says. "But it's nuts how many want us to do this for them here in this region."
The "mining" process requires huge amounts of electricity. After the value of Bitcoin spiked above $19,000 in December, the cryptocurrency world turned its attention to Central Washington, which has the cheapest electricity in the entire country thanks to dams along the Columbia River and other bodies of water.
For months, public utility districts (or PUDs) throughout the state have been hounded with requests for power at unprecedented levels: People are asking for 20, 50, 100 megawatts of electricity, with one caller even asking the Pend Oreille County PUD where they could get 2 gigawatts — enough to power more than 1 million homes.
In response to this modern gold rush, many cities and utilities are pumping the brakes as they decide if and how to build out their infrastructure for an industry many people still don't understand and that experts warn could totally collapse. Since mid-February, a wave of Central Washington cities and utilities passed temporary bans or limitations on the operations.
"This is Bitcoin: Wild West 2.0," Salcido says.
For the record, Salcido thinks the moratoriums and interim controls on new digital mining are a good thing: He went through a similar years-long moratorium process with local agencies after he first got in the game in 2013.
And he understands people's skepticism: What if this technology doesn't get adopted? What's the point? After first learning about Bitcoin, Salcido says he saw it going one of two ways.
"This tech will either become nothing — Furby dolls, pet rocks, Betamax — OK? Or it's going to disrupt every industry I can think of, and probably some I can't," Salcido says. "It's either a major market disruptor and major market creator, or it's nothing. It's one of those two. It won't be a niche technology."
He's banking on it changing the world.
Malachi Salcido, founder and CEO of Salcido Enterprises, believes blockchain technology will change how everyone shares data.