The decades-long battle over proposed large mines in Southwest Alaska may be catching up to modern
times, with a newly-discovered deposit of cryptocurrency worth billions
of dollars. Proponents are calling the newly discovered “Rubble”
cryptocurrency prospect, located near the site of the proposed Pebble
mine, the region’s next great hope for economic development, jobs, and
“HODLing.”
The
Vancouver, Canada based junior exploration company Northern Dynasty
announced their recent findings regarding Rubble on Monday, and unveiled
plans to extract the highly variable digital currency using “really
super efficient and safe methods that won’t disturb anything.”
“This
is big,” said new Northern Dynasty CEO Brogan Putnam. “This is like
kinda Scrooge McDuck doing the backstroke in a swimming pool of gold
coins type big, picture it - but like, with crypto, so yeah maybe like
that but with virtual reality goggles instead of the actual pool of gold
coins, so yeah… and, there’ll be jobs!”
While
it remains unclear what a cryptocurrency mine would actually look like
or what it might mean for the southwest Alaska region, it doesn’t really
matter since no one understands what cryptocurrency is anyway.
When
asked why the mining company chose to transition from a traditional
copper and gold mine to cryptocurrency mine, Putnam described a flexible
investment strategy. “We don’t really give a $%*# what we’re mining
for, we’re a mining company, we’ll mine whatever. As long as we’re
pulling money out of the ground, we’re good.”
Officials
described the Rubble deposit as containing multiple types of
cryptocurrency, including Bitcoin, Ethereum, and traces of some rarer
(yet real) currencies like Dogecoin and Finally Usable Crypto Karma Tokens.
According to digital-geologist Jon Roder, Rubble is known geologically
as a “poryphory” cryptocurrency deposit; indicating it originated tens
of millions of years ago from an anonymous Japanese computer programmer
dwelling in a magma chamber several miles below the earth’s surface. The deposit, which consumes massive quantities of electricity
just to exist, is estimated to currently be consuming power
approximately equal to that of every single home appliance ever sold in
the history of the world.
Long-time
residents of the Bristol Bay region were quick to point out the Rubble
deposit is situated at the headwaters of several major salmon-bearing
watersheds, potentially posing an environmental threat to the region’s
world-class salmon runs.
Robin Samuelsen is the (actual) chairman of the board of the Bristol Bay Economic Development Corporation. Speaking to KTOO Alaska News
recently, he said he has opposed projects like Rubble for more than a
decade: “I’m not against mining, but that mine is in the wrong place,”
he said. “It’s in the spawning grounds — the most productive spawning
grounds in the world.”
Samuelson
also explained that the community was already wealthy with the riches
of wild sockeye salmon, and that they wouldn’t risk their way of life
for the benefit of a foreign mining corporation. “Besides,” said
Samuelson, “nobody out in our villages is stupid enough to think that
Bitcoin is a real thing.”
However,
some residents welcomed the idea of a cryptocurrency mine in the
region. Lime Village mayor Sam Minn pointed to the example of Iceland,
which has leveraged its abundance of cheap hydrothermally-generated
electricity, reliable internet connection, and cool temperatures to
become a hub for large-scale cryptocurrency mines. More electricity is
now consumed by cryptocurrency mining in Iceland than by all the homes in the country combined.
“Why
can’t we do that here too?” said Minn. “All we need is cheap
electricity and reliable internet. Seems do-able,” he said before his
phone cut out for the eleventh time over the course of a ten minute
call.
In
the week since Northern Dynasty’s announcement, the price of Bitcoin
dropped by 323%, then rose 767%, then dropped 1043%, only to rise again
by 10,235%, during which time the Icelandic National Treasury grew by
14.3 billion dollars. Weary investors were encouraged by Deep Horizon
officials to “HODL.”
When asked to comment on Rubble, Alaska governor Mike Dunleavy described cryptocurrency as “nerd stuff” and referred to his recently launched lawsuit to overturn the US Army Corps of Engineers
denial of another large mine permit in the region. “You know what they
say, all that glitters is gold... and, jobs,” said the governor.
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