2024-11-15 –, Nakamoto Stage
With the recent announcement of El Salvador adopting nuclear power it creates a unique opportunity to explore what the future of nuclear power looks like on a Bitcoin Standard. Bitcoin mining is going to revolutionize the economic case for building new nuclear assets big and small, anywhere in the world, that part is obvious to anybody familiar with the power consumption properties of Bitcoin mining. What comes next is even more fascinating. A guaranteed power consumer ensures that enough power for the future can be commissioned in the present with minimal underutilization risks, opening up deployment scenarios that would have been inconceivable. New software allows utilities to be compensated in real-time, and others under development would allow utilities to use lightning payments as part of power conservation programs. As generators begin to earn in Bitcoin, they then have the choice of selling it, hodling it, or putting it to work in countless novel ways in the Bitcoin ecosystem.
Two years ago I was invited to Adopting Bitcoin 2022 to speak on the topic of Nuclear power and Bitcoin mining. At the time my knowledge about either technology was limited, but growing. Since then I have worked tirelessly to promote the idea of mining Bitcoin within the nuclear sector, to mixed success. A slow moving, risk averse industry like nuclear, although will benefit greatly from Bitcoin mining, require immense due diligence when investigating new technology partnerships. That being said, it is my belief that the benefit is so immense that as these two technologies converge, education and conviction will only grow, leading to a gradually, then suddenly dynamic that proliferates through the energy sector so quickly that to those not paying attention, it will feel like an overnight paradigm shift.
I am a laboratory Technologist that works at Canada's nuclear research laboratory. I am an advocate for the peaceful proliferation of nuclear power and a Bitcoin mining enthusiast. In 2022 I was part of a team that won the North American Young Generation in Nuclear's Innovation 4 Nuclear idea competition with the idea of bolstering the economic case for Small Modular Reactors with Bitcoin mining. I have appeared on numerous podcasts to discuss this idea including The Bitcoin Standard, TFTC, Stefan Livera, and We Study Billionaires.
Heidi MacLeod is a Material Planner and Inventory Control Officer at Canadian Nuclear Laboratories based in Chalk River, Ontario.