Cheap Electricity Spurs Construction of Mining “Colo” Center

Published at: Nov. 18, 2014

ASICSPACE, a rackspace provider for hosted Bitcoin mining, has announced the building of a new collocation center in Wenatchee, Washington.

As Bitcoin mining hardware becomes more sophisticated, miners seek more cost-efficient ways to store and power their equipment. Understanding the drive to decrease costs and maximize returns, ASICSPACE has announced that their new colocation (“colo”) center will enable miners to pay for storage and power to their machines. Wenatchee's price of electricity plummets to below 3 cents/kwh, a full 8 cents/kwh below the national average.

Wenatchee’s climate also plays a role in its desirability. “We started out hosting GPU miners for our customers in Portland, Oregon, but we have always had our eyes on Washington because of the cheap electricity,” says Robert Van Kirk, vice president at ASICSPACE. “We were paying 9 cents/kwh for electricity at our GPU mine, plus paying for cooling. Once we’re in the arid climate of central Washington, we won’t even need regular air conditioning, as swamp coolers will work fine.”

The specs: a former juice factory will be turned into ASICSPACE’s 1.3 MW data center. It’s conveniently located within 100 miles of the source of its inexpensive electricity: five giant hydroelectric dams. The dams are so powerful, in fact, that each one of them individually generates more electricity than the entire Bitcoin network utilizes.

These dams are the main reason why power in Washington State is not only the cheapest in North America, but in the entire western hemisphere, as well. ASICSPACE CEO, Damir Kalinkin, stated:

“We will sell capacity, month-to-month, at US$95/kw/month. For the quality of rackspace we are bringing online, this is the best price I’ve seen anywhere.”

The center is set to be fully operational by January 15, 2015, but customers may start mining as soon as January 1. ASICSPACE reports that they will know by December 7 exactly how soon rackspace tenants can start moving in. ASICSPACE also offers negotiated discounts for clients using more than 30 KW or paying their contracts in advance.

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