Iceland cuts electricity to new Bitcoin miners

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Icelandic national electricity company Landsvirkjun has reduced the amount of electricity it will supply to certain industries, including aluminum smelters and Bitcoin miners.

A representative for the islands power company reported that it was forced to cut power allocations to Southwest Bitcoin miners and various industrial facilities due to a series of issues, including an issue in a power plant, low hydraulic reservoir levels and access to energy from an external supplier. .

Mining operations have long been attracted to the country because of its abundance of geothermal energy which is harvested to create an abundant and cheap supply of renewable energy. But from December 7 for an unknown duration, any new demand for electricity from mining operations will be rejected, according to Landsvirkjun.

Canadas Hive Blockchain Technologies, Genesis Mining and Bitfury Holding are the three major Bitcoin mining companies that have opened facilities in Iceland.

For nearly a decade, miners have tried to fulfill the promise of environmentally friendly Bitcoin mining in Iceland. In 2013, Cloud Hashing moved 100 miners to Iceland. In November 2017, Austrian company HydroMiner GmbH raised around $ 2.8 million in its Initial Coin Offering (ICO) to install mining rigs directly into Icelandic power plants.

Less than 1% of the country’s electricity is produced from non-renewable sources.

Related: UN Climate Change Targets for COP26 Include New Taxes on Technology and Carbon

The country’s aluminum smelting industry has been hit hardest by the distribution failure. Aluminum prices rose 1.1% on December 7 to reflect the supply bottleneck created by a recent increase in demand and the current electricity supply crisis.

Globally, green blockchain initiatives became all the rage in 2021. Thought leaders at the COP26 conference in Glasgow, Scotland discussed energy-intensive bitcoin mining. The conference saw the launch of the GloCha United Citizens Organization (UCO) for action on climate empowerment. It will use blockchain technology to advance climate change goals.

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