Do you know the story about the guy who threw a fortune in the trash? I'm talking about James Howells. This guy will go down in history not for what he achieved, but for what he lost. And in a really dramatic way.

In 2009, James Howells, a British computer engineer, started mining bitcoins for fun. Back then, Bitcoin was practically worthless, so anyone with a computer could do it on their laptop. Howell mined 7,500 BTC. Quite a number, right? The thing is, no one thought it would ever be worth anything someday.

Fast forward to 2013 — Howell had long stopped mining. He shoved the hard drive with the bitcoins into a drawer, thinking he might need it someday. And then, during cleaning, he did something that became his biggest regret. He accidentally threw away that drive, thinking it was old, useless equipment.

The drive ended up at the Docksway landfill in Newport, Wales. A dump the size of a football field, with layers of waste reaching up to 15 meters. The chances of finding it seemed practically zero. But James Howell didn’t give up.

Until now. Because those 7,500 bitcoins are worth over $617 million today. And James Howell has a plan. He claims he could reach even a billion before anything changes. He’s working on a 12-month project to search the landfill using X-ray scanning devices and AI technology. He has assembled a consortium of experts to cut through all the doubts from the city council.

Local authorities had rejected his requests for years. First citing safety risks. Then Howell proposed funding from venture capital, even offering a significant portion of the recovered bitcoins as a reward for help. Nothing worked. The council firmly said no.

But wait, it gets interesting. If James Howell actually recovers that drive, he already has a plan for Newport. He promised to give 50 pounds in bitcoin to every one of the 160,000 residents of the city. He wants to turn Newport into the first cryptocurrency hub in the UK. He talked about it in an interview with Richard Hammond.

Honestly, James Howell’s story is a modern treasure hunt. It’s also a warning for all of us. It shows how important backups and secure storage of digital assets are. Especially now, when prices are what they are.

Will he succeed? Nobody knows. But James Howell definitely won’t give up. Sometimes persistence and belief in a plan can change everything. And maybe, in the meantime, it’s worth checking if you have backups of your important stuff, right?