[yogenpro]

And it's NOT a waste of resource. Miners mostly use seasonal renewable energy that otherwise would not be converted to electricity in the first place.

To maximize profit, they utilize hydroelectric power plants built on Yangtze river. Not the ones like Three Gorges Dam, but those small/micro plants (<10MW installed capacity). Most of those plants are owned by local governments or private companies. Usually, State Grid -- which is obviously owned by the state -- would purchase their power output but during rainy seasons, there is just too much electricity that State Grid wouldn't buy it all.

That's when miners came and built datacenters close to the power plants, made deals with the power plant owners to buy the power that State Grid didn't want. It's a win-win for everyone: power plants get extra cash, miners get cheap electricity.

And when it comes to dry season (starting October), miners ship their mining rig to Xinjiang or Gansu, where wind turbines are having a similar situation.

[hueving]

One season perfectly coinciding with another with a giant consistent pile of surplus electricity? And all of these miners transport whole data centers worth of miners a couple of times a year?

I want to believe it but this sounds too convenient to be true. It sounds more like propaganda invented to cover up the massive waste of energy. Do you have any sources to back it up?

Also, most dams don't produce more electricity during high level seasons. They generally produce a fixed amount with a constant flow to the generators and then the only thing that changes is the spillways being used during the wet season.

[yogenpro]

Well definitely not perfectly coincided. In fact in dry seasons some went to Inner Mongolia where coal is cheap and coal power stations' output is much stabler... That part indeed is a waste :\

Some sources:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/in-chinas-...

His latest mine is still under construction, between a hydroelectric power plant and the concrete shell of a disused power transmission station, between Kongyu and the city of Kangding.

As China’s economy boomed, private companies set up hydroelectric plants in western Sichuan; then, as the economy slowed, they found themselves unable to sell to the national grid, elbowed out of the market by more politically powerful state-owned firms.

“It took a lot of money to build the plants, but it doesn’t cost that much to maintain them,” said HaoBTC’s Mu. “So it makes sense for them to sell the power to anyone willing to buy, even at a low rate.”

Also:

https://news.bitcoin.com/brief-glimpse-lives-chinese-bitcoin...

http://en.people.cn/n3/2017/0223/c90000-9181806.html