Spending $11 Million To Dig A Dump To Find 8,000 Bitcoins

Using a robotic dog and an AI-powered sorter, James Howells wanted to find a hard drive containing 8,000 Bitcoins that was mistakenly thrown away nine years ago in a landfill in Wales.

In 2013, James Howells owned two identical hard drives, and he was an engineer living in Newport (Wales). One has no data, and the other contains 8,000 Bitcoins or more than $181 million at today’s exchange rates.

While cleaning up his desk, instead of throwing away the empty hard drive, Howells mistakenly dumped the hard drive containing 8,000 Bitcoins into the landfill. After nine years, the 36-year-old former IT engineer still longs to find the hard drive and the cryptocurrency he earned in 2009.

The $11 million landfill scavenger hunt

Howells wants the local government to allow the use of high-tech equipment to find the hard drive buried under the mountain of trash that has been leveled. Newport City Council has consistently rejected Howells’ requests for the past nine years, saying it would be costly and harmful to the environment.

Even so, Howells was undeterred. In an interview with Business Insider, he shared his new $11 million venture-funded plan to dig up 110,000 tons of trash.

Besides using humans, Howells’ detailed drive search plan includes robot dogs and artificial intelligence (AI) sorting machines. The 36-year-old former engineer hopes the Newport government will accept the proposal.

The plan includes two options based on the amount of waste the Newport government allows digging. Howells estimates the first option would take three years to dig through 110,000 tons of trash, costing $11 million. Meanwhile, the second option will cost $6 million for 18 months.

Howells has assembled a team of 8 members, including experts in AI classification, garbage mining, garbage management, and data extraction. Among them was a consultant who worked for the company that recovered the black box data in the space shuttle Columbia tragedy.

Using robot dogs, AI-integrated classifiers

The machines will dig up the trash and take it to the sorting facility at a nearby construction site. Team members are contracted to work and will receive a remuneration if the Bitcoins in the hard drive are successfully retrieved. According to Howells, this project resembles a well-organized commercial plan.

In addition to regular employees, the garbage sorting process is supported by an AI machine from a company called Max-AI. Remi Le Grand, a representative of Max-AI, said that the company would train an AI algorithm to detect hard drives that look like Howells’ drives. The machine will be equipped with an arm to move the suspicious object to a separate area.

Howells also deducts part of the cost to protect the landfill and prevent strangers from breaking in. Security devices include cameras and two robotic dogs called Spot, made by Boston Dynamics for nighttime patrol. They can also scan the surrounding area for objects suspected to be hard drives.

In May, the Howells team rehearsed at a resort before presenting the plan to Newport City Council. The session was videotaped and featured Richard Hammond, host of the BBC’s Top Gear program, set to release a documentary about the Howells.

Once completed, the landfill will be cleaned and recycled as much as possible, and the non-recyclable waste will be buried below. Upstairs, the Howells team wants to build a solar or wind farm.

It’s not easy to convince the city council

The cost of $11 million for the project of digging garbage to find hard drives came from venture capital. Hanspeter Jaberg and Karl Wendeborn, two investors from Switzerland and Germany, pledged to provide capital if the city council approved Howells’ plan.

“It’s obviously a needle in the haystack, and it’s a very, very high-risk investment,” Jaberg said.

Despite the cost, the use of modern technology, and the environmental commitment, the city council admits it is not easy to approve Howells’ plan. A council representative told Insider:

“There is nothing that Mr. Howells could present to us that would make the council agree. His proposals pose significant ecological risk, which we cannot accept and indeed are prevented from considering by the terms of our permit.”

Howells said he didn’t have a contract with the prospective backers but had discussed the plan in Zoom meetings. “Until I’ve got something in writing from Newport City Council,” he said, “there is nothing to sign up to.”

If the city council rejects the proposal, Howells plans to sue the Newport government, alleging an “illegal embargo” of the hard drive. Of course, the 36-year-old former IT engineer wants to work with the city council instead of going to court.

Howells spoke to the local council in May 2021 through a 20-minute online meeting. He also met Jessica Morden, congressman for Newport, on June 24.

“This is the best situation I’ve been in so far,” he said. “This is the most professional operation we’ve put together, and we’ve got all the best people involved.”

Does the hard drive still work?

Even if the board allows and successfully searches, it is unlikely that the hard drive will still work correctly. The most crucial part of a hard drive is the magnetic platter used to store data. According to Howells, there is an 80-90% chance of successful data retrieval if the magnetic disk has not been cracked.

Phil Bridge, the hard drive data recovery expert, said the above ratio is correct. However, if the magnetic disk part is damaged, the ability to access and recover data will be minimal.

In the event of successful access to the 8,000 Bitcoins in the hard drive, Howells will retain about 30% or $54 million in today’s value.

About a third of the money will go to the mining team, 30% to investors, and the rest is $61 in Bitcoin divided among Newport city residents (about 150,000 people). This number is down from the plan put forward by Howells when Bitcoin peaks in 2021.

DISCLAIMER: The Information on this website is provided as general market commentary and does not constitute investment advice. We encourage you to do your own research before investing.

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