Crypto miners in Kazakhstan face bitter winter of blackouts

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Illegal miners and massive relocations after China’s crypto mining ban have overloaded the energy grid. From a report: Matthew Heard, a software engineer from San Jose, is worried about his 33 bitcoin mining machines in Kazakhstan. Over the past week, they continued to be shut down in an attempt by the national grid to limit the power used by crypto miners. “My machines have been offline for days,” he said. “Over the past week, even though my machines turn on, they barely stay on.” Kazakhstan is struggling to cope with the huge popularity of crypto mining, driven this year in part by the sharp rise in the value of cryptocurrencies and in part by a massive migration of miners to its borders after China made mining illegal in May.

After the emergency shutdown of three large power plants in the north of the country last month, the public grid operator, Kegoc, warned it would start rationing the electricity of the 50 crypto miners who are registered with the government , and said they would be “connected first” if the network had any problems. Heard moved to Kazakhstan in August and its machines are managed by Enegix, a company that rents space to run machines. crypto mining machines. He said his earnings had risen from an average of $ 1,200 worth of bitcoin per day to $ 800 in October, and that over the past week, his machines did not work. that 55% of the time Machine owners are not notified when shutdowns are going to occur or when they will come back online, he said.

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