We are a world built on top of the rails afforded energy and power production. Whether we are discussing your smartphone in your hand, the shirt on your back, the home or apartment you reside in, or the electricity that is serviced to your domicile… none of that would be available without energy generation and power production.

Within this vein it is imperative that the reader understand not just how important energy and power provision is to the world, but also how sensitive these mechanisms are. Whether we are dealing in molecules (such as oil and gas) or in electrons (power) both are commodities, meaning that supply and demand exert great influence over the pricing of these products. The pull or push of supply and demand can be influenced by forces such as weather (outside of human influence) as well as human legislation such as regulations over emissions standards, tariffs, and sanctions.

“Verde Mining’s course ‘How to mine on flare gas’ was fantastic. The team, information, classroom, and field instruction are top notch. I walked away with all the tools and contacts necessary to confidently source, structure, fund, build, and operate a flare gas mine. This is more than just some instructional course, it is an intimate, student focused, hands on relationship building experience. Verde Mining is passionate about their mission, and I highly recommend for anyone, at any stage of their journey, to experience such an atmosphere of dedicated and knowledgeable instruction.”

– Joe Hamlin

Further weighing on the pricing mechanism for these commodities is their transportation to market. As discussed between Paul Cockerham CEO of Verde Mining on the Hashrate Up podcast (linked here), there is added difficulty for oil and gas producers to transport material to such a market (or buyer) when a project must build out infrastructure to enable transmission. Will the owners of the land that a project has to traverse permit building of infrastructure through their property? They have every right to refuse. Then there’s the matter of paying for said infrastructure to get a molecule like natural gas to a buyer. All of these dynamics must be incorporated into the decision-making on what to do with production of a resource, and especially for a resource that comes as a byproduct of production of a completely different resource, in this case oil.

That’s a lot of hoops to dance through for producers. It’s no surprise why so many have elected to simply vent or burn (aka flaring) their natural gas yield off oil production rather than engage in capital expenditure (capex) for building out such infrastructure. This is why bitcoin miners are engaging in joint venture (JV) agreements with oil producers while compensating these operations by paying for this resource at the location of production; the well-head. This allows for the producer to avoid the capex of building out the infrastructure to transport their gas production to a buyer by bringing the producer onsite and earning revenue off the production of bitcoin by integrating bitcoin mining into their production stack.

“It’s rare in this business to find someone who has deep field experience in both O&G and Bitcoin, and is willing to share all his valuable knowledge. Enter Paul Cockerham, the OG of flare gas mining. I attended Verde’s course in Midland and received the best education one could imagine in the flare gas niche. Paul’s level of transparency, passion and teaching skills were off the chart. I don’t think you’ll find any better course or instructor. Five-star rating!”

– Frank Eakin

Verde Mining is taking a cleverly novel approach to this relationship. On top of providing these services to oil producers with complementary natural gas production the Verde Mining team also hosts educational courses to teach producers how they can incorporate bitcoin mining operations into their projects. They have a course coming up here in a few weeks lasting 3 days that covers: miner assembly, repair, and configuration, network & IT setup, and engineering, maintenance and electrical work. Complete with operation walkthroughs onsite and covering of financial models for operational prudence. For those that are interested, or have an employer that is interested, in such an education check out their twitter, linkedin, and send inquiries to: mike@verdemining.com.

We need as many individuals and organizations getting educated on not only the value of bitcoin mining but also the know-how for safe and properly functioning bitcoin mining operations. 

This is a guest post by Mike Hobart. Opinions expressed are entirely their own and do not necessarily reflect those of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Magazine.