From One S9 Miner to a 2 MW Hydropower Site in Nigeria

Jan 21, 2025

From One S9 Miner to a 2 MW Hydropower Site in Nigeria

Jan 21, 2025

If you’re going to operate a Bitcoin mining site anywhere in the world, you’ve got to be able to tackle infrastructural, locational, and scaling problems. Trojan Mining overcame this with flying colors with the help of a thriving Bitcoin mining ecosystem in Africa. 

 

Running a single Bitcoin mining rig in your house poses a challenge, but perhaps none quite so daunting as running the whole mining site operating on a 2 MW transformer. 

 

In terms of desire, not even the ambitious foreign exchange traders surpass what Siyanbola Yassar, the CEO of Trojan Mining is trying to achieve. TrojanMining has rolled out a new plan to scale to a 2 MW hydropower site  from one S9 Bitcoin miner just in a few years. By contrast, its CEO, Siyanbola, has gone from taking loans from friends and family and  purchasing faulty mining rigs from China to having fully operational mining sites in northeastern Nigeria.

 

Hordes of people wanting to write such a wonderful Bitcoin story might be wondering how he achieved this. Siyanbola started off as a Forex trader, then shifted to shitcoin trading, hoping for a 10X or 100X he ended up losing all his money in 2020. Before he could throw in the towel, he realized that Bitcoin was always holding and stumbled upon the iconic “Bitcoin Whitepaper”.  He was fascinated with the hardware and infrastructural aspects that powered Bitcoin, which kind of resonated with him.

How Did Trojan Mining Scale Like That?

Nigeria’s 1st internationally recognized bitcoin mining farm was created and run by a team of close friends, which meant that at one time, some ASIC miners were being run in their individual homes. This earned them their first BTC coins.

 

“When you get your first proof of concept (PoC), you start thinking about scaling up… Where we get money to buy additional ASIC miners because we’re starting to grow,” recounted Siyanbola. 

 

Their hiccups came early since they realized that the power in their area was only available for 6 hours. They learned fast they needed to deal with this stuff urgently. This led them to discover the untapped potential of hydroelectric power in northeastern Nigeria. 

 

The power company operating in the North was no stranger to a synergy-centric mechanism for its generated electricity. It used to incentivize the community where it was operating. When Trojan Mining approached them, it was a smooth experience so long as the company contributed to the community fund. 

 

“We only had to rent a house to become part of the community [access free power] and start mining,” said Siyanbola.

Still, even an event like that doesn’t guarantee smooth operation. Siyanbola recalls that it became impossible to plug and play their ASIC miners from their homes’ walls due to the poor electrical infrastructure used to connect the entire community.

They developed a shed model of Bitcoin mining and moved its miners close to the substation to tap the power directly. But still, they had the noise nuisance from the miners.

 

From electrical engineers to noise engineers, they created a working setup of two containers with the help of the power company.

 

Trojan Mining relied on its good relationship with the community to avoid potential resistance. In this case, it had to employ security personnel and contractors within the community.  

Trojan Mining in Nigeria
Photos by @@TrojanMining on X

AfroBitcoin Conference in Accra, Ghana was the Turning Point

One thing that kept bugging them was the constant machine breakdowns and depreciation.  But instead of waiting for experts to come fix them, they went to YouTube University to learn how to fix PLCs and hashpads. 

 

A  fascinating aspect of this new experience was when they met Erick Hersman, CEO of Gridless, who invited them to the  African Bitcoin Conference. Nobody knew how all this would develop, but meeting  other miners across Africa was a game changer. In Eric, they now had an industry leader who was willing to help them out with infrastructure and hardware issues. As a result, they established a 500 kW setup with multiple mini-grids.  

 

Meeting others doing the same thing would instill an even greater purpose for Bitcoin mining beyond its monetary advantages. For example, they started attending industry-related events such as the Africa Bitcoin Mining Summit. By the end of all this exposure, Siyanbola and his team realized that there were scaling opportunities in places like Ethiopia. That learning would then be transferred to a proper mining site, which has better economic and environmental benefits. In 2024, TrojanMining had scaled up operations in Nigeria, running 500 kW 120+ miners in Q1 & Q2. In Q3 it improved its operations to 3,000 kW at 800+ ASIC miners.

 

Want to learn more?

 

Get the inaugural edition of Chaintum Magazine, “Bitcoin Mining in Africa,” delivered straight to your inbox: https://chaintum.io/newsletter/

 

 

Credit to HashrateUp Podcast by Jesse Hodl

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