人工智慧資料中心推動比特幣挖礦經濟的微妙方式

對廉價電子的競爭可能會為算力價格設定底線，或至少減緩算力成長。

The burgeoning presence of artificial intelligence (AI) data centers might be good news for bitcoin miners — even those who have nothing to do with AI.

人工智慧（AI）資料中心的蓬勃發展對比特幣礦工來說可能是個好消息——即使是那些與人工智慧無關的礦工。

Here’s why: The competition between AI data centers and bitcoin miners for cheap electricity could wind up putting a floor on hashprice, a key metric used by miners to gauge their revenue.

原因如下：人工智慧資料中心和比特幣礦工之間對廉價電力的競爭可能最終會為哈希價格設定底線，哈希價格是礦工用來衡量收入的關鍵指標。

“Every potential mining investment now goes through this filter: is it better to use this site for AI purposes or mining,” Spencer Marr, president of bitcoin mining firm Sangha Renewables, told CoinDesk. “Every time they choose AI or other forms of high-performance computing, that means hashrate won’t climb, and hashprice won’t be negatively impacted.”

比特幣礦業公司 Sangha Renewables 總裁 Spencer Marr 告訴 CoinDesk：“現在每一項潛在的礦業投資都會經過這個過濾器：將這個網站用於人工智能目的還是採礦更好。” “每次他們選擇人工智慧或其他形式的高效能運算，這意味著哈希率不會攀升，哈希價格也不會受到負面影響。”

Hashrate is a measure of the total combined computational power backing a Proof-of-Work blockchain, in this case Bitcoin. Hashprice, meanwhile, is the amount of bitcoin that a miner can expect to earn each time their machines perform a certain number of hashes, or computations, on a given timeframe.

算力是支持工作量證明區塊鏈（在本例中為比特幣）的總運算能力的衡量標準。同時，哈希價格是指礦工在給定時間範圍內每次機器執行一定數量的哈希或計算時可以預期賺取的比特幣數量。

At press time, bitcoin’s hashrate totalled 770 exahash per second (EH/s), per Hashrate Index data, with bitcoin’s hashprice coming in at $61.12 per petahash per day. Hashprice has been steadily decreasing as mining has grown more competitive. Back in 2017, for example, it wasn’t uncommon for hashprice to clock in above $1,000 by that measure.

根據哈希率指數數據，截至發稿時，比特幣的哈希率總計為每秒 770 exahash (EH/s)，比特幣的哈希價格為每天每 petahash 61.12 美元。隨著挖礦競爭變得更加激烈，哈希價格一直在穩步下降。例如，早在 2017 年，以這項標準計算，哈希價格突破 1,000 美元的情況並不罕見。

Establishing a floor on hashprice would be valuable for miners as it would guarantee that computing power will never go below a certain threshold in terms of value, no matter the conditions.

建立哈希價格下限對於礦工來說很有價值，因為它可以保證無論條件如何，計算能力的價值永遠不會低於某個門檻。

“In the competition for access to cheap electricity, miners are starting to be squeezed out by more willing purchasers in the form of other forms of compute,” Marr said. “It’s a specific game theory, because as the miner, you like to see other people deciding to use cheap electrons for other purposes than Bitcoin compute because of the competitive nature of mining.”

馬爾表示：“在爭奪廉價電力的競爭中，礦工開始被更願意以其他形式的計算形式購買的人擠出。” “這是一個特定的博弈論，因為作為礦工，你希望看到其他人決定將廉價電子用於比特幣計算之外的其他目的，因為採礦的競爭性質。”

But the squeeze may simply lead bitcoin miners to up and move to other jurisdictions across the globe where AI data centers aren’t sprouting left and right, Jaran Mellerud, co-founder of bitcoin mining hardware and hosting services firm Hashlabs Mining, told CoinDesk.

但比特幣挖礦硬體和託管服務公司Hashlabs Mining 的聯合創始人 Jaran Mellerud 告訴CoinDesk，這種擠壓可能只會導致比特幣礦工遷往全球其他人工智慧資料中心尚未興起的司法管轄區。

“I don’t think the competition for power from AI facilities will significantly impact hashprice,” Mellerud said. “The Bitcoin mining network is a self-correcting mechanism, so reduced hashrate in one country will simply increase profitability of miners in another country, giving them more room to grow.”

「我認為人工智慧設施的電力競爭不會對哈希價格產生重大影響，」梅勒魯德說。 “比特幣挖礦網絡是一種自我糾正機制，因此一個國家的算力降低只會增加另一個國家礦工的盈利能力，從而為他們提供更多的增長空間。”

“My thesis is that the U.S. will have less than 20% of the hashrate by 2030 due to competition from AI facilities, while hashrate will grow elsewhere, particularly in Africa and Southeast Asia,” Mellerud added.

Mellerud 補充說：“我的觀點是，由於人工智慧設施的競爭，到 2030 年，美國的算力將佔不到 20%，而其他地方的算力將會增長，特別是在非洲和東南亞。”

Marr agreed these were valid points, though he pointed out that at the end of the day, “there is a finite number of rock bottom cheap electrons.” AI data centers are also trickier to operate than bitcoin mines; they require constant uptime, for example, and are much more expensive to build and run.

馬爾同意這些觀點是正確的，但他指出，歸根結底，“最低價的廉價電子的數量是有限的。”人工智慧資料中心的運作也比比特幣礦場更棘手；例如，它們需要持續的正常運行時間，並且建置和運行的成本要高得多。

“Maybe in the end the competition for electrons slows down but doesn’t stop hashrate growth,” Marr said.

「也許最終電子競爭會放緩，但不會阻止算力增長，」馬爾說。