The state of New York has doubled down on energy-guzzling cryptocurrency mining farms. Final month, a invoice handed by the state Meeting that instantly targets Proof-of-Work (PoW) blockchains resembling Bitcoin and the yet-unMerged Ethereum. The measure imposes a two-year moratorium on new PoW mining farm installations powered by carbon-based gas. Nonetheless, it leaves initiatives based mostly on renewable vitality sources or much less energy-intensive Proof of Stake (PoS) mining operations ticking alongside unencumbered.
Following China’s crackdown and an outright ban on cryptocurrency mining, many operators re-localized to Kazakhstan and the US, generally inserting undue pressure on present energy infrastructures. Chief among the many U.S. choices for miners was the state of New York, resulting from its comparatively low-cost energy sourced from hydroelectric amenities and a rising variety of decommissioned or in any other case disabled carbon-based powerplants that cryptocurrency mining specialists might spin up with relative ease.
