James Howells, a British IT worker, acquired more than 7,500 bitcoins in 2009 when they were worth almost nothing. Now, a single bitcoin is worth almost $100,000, which puts his stash at more than $700 million. Unfortunately, Howells accidentally threw the hard disk containing the key into the trash. He has a plan to get the money back, according to The Guardian. He wants to buy a landfill where it might be buried and dig it up.
Howells doesn’t know exactly where the hard drive is, but he has a strong guess based on when he threw it in the trash. He narrowed the search to a specific area of a landfill in South Wales that holds 15,000 metric tons of waste. The landfill is approaching maximum capacity, so Howells wants to buy it from the city. Officials have warned that the hard drive is “buried under 25,000 cubic meters of waste and earth” as it has been there for almost 12 years.
Until the city makes a final decision, it doesn’t look good for Howells and his “needle in a haystack” plan. The haphazard excavation of the landfill poses a serious environmental hazard. The excavation process would be risky and expensive. Subsequently, the landfill would need to be reclaimed, which is another expensive project. The city also plans to build a solar power plant on part of the land.
Finally, there is the hard disk itself. Can anything be recovered after it’s been under tons and tons of garbage for 12 years? It seems unlikely, although Howells and his investors apparently have some serious data scientists on staff.
This is just the latest attempt by Howells to treat the landfill as an archaeological site where he is looking for his lost fortune. He has been doing this for more than a decade. In 2017, he asked the city authorities to allow him to dig, but officials refused, citing safety concerns and fears of inciting treasure hunters to descend on the dump with shovels.
In 2021, he tried to sweeten the pot by offering the city 25 percent of the bitcoin he found. Again, the city refused. In 2022, Howells came up with a particularly bizarre scheme that involved sending Boston Dynamics robot dogs to conduct excavations. You can imagine how the city responded to this (namely, “no”).
There was another attempt to turn the landfill into a mining facility that was unsuccessful. In the end, Howells decided to sue the city of Newport for the right to roam the landfill like a really nasty, shit-covered Indiana Jones. The judge threw out the lawsuit, ruling that the case had no “realistic chance of success.”
So that’s where we are now. Howells and his investors are trying to buy out the landfill while the city ponders the issue. We will update this post when we learn more about this strange story of one man’s quest for wealth. By the way, this will definitely become a limited edition on Peacock or something, right?
