A Welsh IT engineer James Howells, has ended his 12-year search for a hard drive containing 8,000 Bitcoin that he discarded in a Newport landfill in 2013.

Howells accidentally threw away the device when he cleared out old computer parts at home in Newport, Wales, United Kingdom. He had meant to discard a different hard drive and only realized the mistake days later.

The lost drive came from a Dell laptop he had dismantled and it contained the private keys to his Bitcoin wallet, without which the cryptocurrency is permanently inaccessible.

The Welsh engineer had mined the Bitcoin back in 2009 during the early days of the currency when it had little to no market value. The hard drive sat untouched in a drawer for years before the accidental disposal.

His push to retrieve the drive made headlines for years with plans involving AI powered robots, drones, and even legal action.

However, Newport City Council consistently blocked the efforts citing environmental risks and regulatory concerns tied to the landfill.

After more than a decade of rejection and stalled proposals, Howells has decided to stop. The hard drive remains buried under tons of waste in the UK, marking one of the most infamous losses in crypto history.

Predictions say that hard drive could be worth $8 billion by 2030!