New York Bitcoin miners are buying old power plants. New Yorkers are not happy

Minar Bitcoins can be a very profitable business, but the growing difficulty of adding a new block and the rules of the economy of scale make, in the end, they are only earning money the mining farms that have access to huge amounts of energy at a low price.

What are mining farms. They are large data centers full of ASICs, computers specialized in solving cryptographic problems. His work is to find a hash (the output of a mathematical function called SHA-256) to appear a valid block.

This process orders and propagates the safe transactions of the Bitcoin block chain, which has a juicy reward: every time a miner manages to add a block to the chain (once every approximately 10 minutes), receives 3,125 new bitcoins, the equivalent of 101,606 dollars. But not everything is benefit. In fact, Minar Bitcoin has a very high energy cost.

This is where the price of electricity comes into play. And the north of the state of New York is especially attractive thanks to its abundant hydroelectric energy. But hydroelectric plants are not exactly the main objective of mining farms.

Bitcoin gas and mining plants. In New York, the energy appetite of Bitcoin’s miners has reached a dystopian look with companies that acquire old or little used electric power plants, mainly of natural gas, to feed their operations 24/7.

The old Greenidge generation coal plant, located next to Lake Senecato the north of the state, it became a combined cycle center in 2017, operating only when the energy demand was high. In 2020, the company installed a Bitcoin mining farm next to the plant.

Greenidge Generation opened the ban. In 2018, the combined cycle plant supplied 203,918 MWh to the electricity network. In 2020, with mining as its main business, it began to burn much more gas, generating 215,588 MWh for the network and additional MWH for mine Bitcoin.

Its emissions have multiplied by six since the Bitcoin mine is, according to a report of Inside Climate News. But in addition, he sealed a kind of symbiosis between gas plants and cryptocurrency mining. Greenidge became a proof of concept to resurrect another 49 similar plants in the state of New York.

In a legal limbo. New York is not precisely a permissive state in Environment Policy. The Environmental Conservation Department denied the renewal of Greenidge permits in 2022 for violating the climate law of the State, which requires strong emission reductions.

However, Greenidge continues to operate thanks to his appeals. The state law allows you to work as long as the administrative process lasts.

New Yorkers are not happy. Another controversial case is that of Digi Power X. The Canadian company bought Fortistar the Combined Cycle of North Tonawanda, near the Niagara cataracts, to feed its own Bitcoins farm.

The neighbors began to complain about a “persistent buzz” from the huge fans that refrigerate the data center. They ended up demanding the company, which triggered a two -year moratorium and formal studies on the noise and water consumption of the installation, estimated at 1.9 million liters to cool the servers. It is not drinking water, but exerts pressure on local wastewater infrastructure.

In November 2024, the New York Supreme Court ordered the Public Services Commission to reassess the sale of Fortistar for a possible violation of the state climate law. However, as with Greenidge, the plant can continue to operate while the process lasts.

The battle continues. With Trump things have changed at the federal level. In favor of miners. The new administration has raised restrictions on the use of fossil fuels and has promoted a new more lax regulatory framework for cryptocurrencies.

Meanwhile, despite legal battles, Greenidge and North Tonawanda mines continue to operate, along with their associated electric power plants. According to the United States Energy Information Agency, cryptocurrency mining represents up to 2.3% of the country’s total electricity consumption.

In Xataka | Bitcoin is not to blame for a glacier lake to have become a “hot jacuzzi.” Still