Intel Gets the Patent for Bitcoin Mining With Better Energy Efficiency

Last week, computer processor manufacturer and tech giant Intel secured a patent for mining Bitcoin with less energy consumption and better efficiency. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office awarded a patent that outlines a processing chip conduct “energy-efficient high performance bitcoin mining”.

Moreover, the patent specifically goes to mention the SHA-256 algorithm used by Bitcoin. Bitcoin mining industry has recently taken a hit with the primary reason of mining costs going high. Simultaneously, the Bitcoin price is continuously rolling downwards since the beginning of the year and as a result the profitability of the miners has dropped considerably.

During the last month’s crypto market crash, several Bitcoin mining firms announced the closure of their operations as the BTC price went below $4000. The Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus algorithm of Bitcoin increases the computational complexity of adding the next block to the blockchain. Thus the miners need to use hardware accelerators like the application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs) which consume high amount of electricity. Not only are the ASIC chips costly, but the huge electricity bill also adds up additionally to the mining cost.

The Intel patent goes to argues that the new Intel chips will work a step further than the ASIC miners. The problem with the current ASIC miners is that they process the application specific data in different stages which makes the mining process less efficient. The new Intel chip, on the other hand, can process this data at once.

The patent talks about hard-wiring this part of the mining process in a particular section of the chip. This will curb all the redundant process to mine the block or verify the transaction. As a result, it will reduce the overall amount of time and energy for the process.

The patent explains: “Dedicated Bitcoin mining ASICs are used to implement multiple SHA-256 engines that may deliver a performance of thousands of hashes per second while consuming power of greater than 200 [watts]. Embodiments of the present disclosure employ micro-architectural optimizations including selective hardwiring certain parameters in Bitcoin mining computation.”

Intel says that its new processors will not only be compact in comparison to the ASICs, but also reduce energy consumption by 15 percent.