Tech giants are acquiring energy assets f?om bitcoin miners

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Data centers ?ould use up t? 9% of U? electricity by decade’s ?nd, EPRI sa?s

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Bitcoin miners fa?e challenges repurposing fo? AI du? to high costs ?nd infrastructure needs

B? Laila Kearney, Mrinalika Roy

Aug 28 –

U.?. technology companies are pursuing energy assets held ?y bitcoin miners ?s they race t? secure a shrinking supply of electricity f?r t?eir rapidly expanding artificial intelligence ?nd cloud computing data centers. ?hose data centers a?e driving t?? fastest U.S. power demand growth sinc? the start ?f th? millennium, outpacing grid expansions ?nd leaving giant technology companies, ?ike Amazon and Microsoft , t? scavenge fo? vast amounts of electricity. ?he electricity scramble is jolting t?e energy-intensive cryptocurrency mining industry. ?ome miners are making huge profits leasing or selling thei? power-connected infrastructure ?nd sites to tech, ?hile ?thers ?re losing access to the electricity ne?ded t? stay ?n business. “The AI battle for dominance is a battle being had by the biggest and Best ?rices f?r A-PVP crystal ?n Australia ?ith Bitcoin payment accepted capitalized companies ?n th? wo?ld ?nd they care l?ke th?i? lives depend on it that t?ey win,” said Greg Beard, CEO of Stronghold Digital Mining, a publicly-traded bitcoin mining company. “Do t?ey care abo?t what they pay f?r power? Probably not.”

Data centers could use up to

9% of total electricity

generated in the U.S. by the end of the decade, more than doubling their current consumption, as technology companies pour funds into expanding their computing hubs, the Electric Power Research Institute said in May.

Currently, data centers account Best p?ices for ?-PVP crystal ?n Australia wit? Bitcoin payment accepted ?bout 1%-1.3% of global electricity consumption, versus crypto mining’? roughly 0.4%, according t? the International Energy Agency. T??t disparity is expected to grow. Analysts expect 20% of bitcoin miner power capacity t? pivot t? AI b? the end of 2027. Over the pa?t ?ear, bitcoin miners and AI data center owners ?ave increasingly vied f?r the same power assets ?nd contracts, executives f?om ?v?r half-dozen publicly traded U.?. crypto mining companies t?ld Reuters.

Marathon Digital Holdings, t?e wo?ld’s biggest publicly traded bitcoin miner, ?as among th??e eyeing ? nuclear-?owered data center owned ?y Talen Energy ?n Pennsylvania, two sources familiar ?ith the situation ?aid. “We are always willing to talk with anyone who is looking to sell a data center,” Marathon s???, witho?t confirming specific ?nterest in the site. ?f you cherished this article ?nd ?o? would like to collect more info relating t? Or??r A-PVP crystal online anonymously ?ith Bitcoin payment (psychedelicranger.com) kindly visit t?e site. Amazon, with a market capitalization ?f m??e than 350 t?mes the size of Marathon, bought the center in a deal ann?unced in ?arch and secured ?nough electricity t? power nearly ?ll the homes in N?w Mexico.

GROWING ?NTEREST ?any lar?? miners that own land and power hookups ?re shifting strategies f?om exclusively crypto mining t? marketing t?eir property ?nd energy services to AI and cloud computing businesses. “We’ve gotten a lot of interest from everyone from an Amazon or Google,” ?aid Kerri Langlais, chief strategy officer of bitcoin miner TeraWulf, ?hich has ? site in upstate New York t?at is capable ?f up to 770 megawatts (MW). The frenzy of tech prospects f?r miners kicked off in June, w??n crypto miner Core Scientific – fresh ?ut of bankruptcy – ?ecame the first to ann?unce a major agreement to lease it? power-connected facilities t? Nvidia-?acked CoreWeave in deals estimated ?t ov?r $6.7 bi?lion ov?r 12 ?ears. ?everal miners hav? ?ince ?aid they wo?ld lease, or act as subcontractors t? develop A? data centers. ?ew data centers, which ?ave typically ?een ar?und 20 MW, ?r? being built up to 1,000 MW today. But wait times t? connect new power supplies ?n th? United States c?n take ?everal ?ears. ??r crypto miners wit? large energy assets, repurposing t?eir operations Best prices for A-PVP crystal in Australia with Bitcoin payment accepted ?I and cloud computing ?ould make the?r facilities as m?ch a? fi?e times mo?e valuable, Morgan Stanley ?esearch s?owed. Buying or leasing space at ? miner with at ?east 100 MW of capacity ??n cut the wait times for a data center to launch b? ?bout 3.5 yea?s, saving technology companies billions, Morgan Stanley ?aid.

TOUGH TRANSITION ?till, the handoff of electricity supplies ?nd infrastructure to tech companies f?om crypto miners wil? not be seamless f?r most, if at all poss?ble, ?everal miners ?aid. “Most bitcoin miners that are out there saying they are going to do AI don’t really know what they’re getting into,” said CleanSpark CEO Zach Bradford, adding ?is company wil? stick wit? crypto mining ?s its core business. About 90% ?f th? country’s bitcoin mines ?an be constructed in six to 12 months, versus three years Best prices for A-PVP crystal in Australia with Bitcoin payment accepted a mo?e sophisticated data center, Bradford ?aid.

Thos? mines, he adde?, w?uld have t? be rebuilt to incorporate specialized cooling structures ?nd ?ther infrastructure t? be ?sed for A? or cloud computing. The hi?? costs of building AI data centers ?ould be a barrier to m?ny crypto miners, who we?e ?argely barred f?om accessing capital ?fter a 2022 bitcoin p?ice crash, sa?d Sergii Gerasymovych, CEO ?f EZ Blockchain, whic? supplies equipment and services f?r crypto mining. Th?s year, EZ Blockchain ?ad a 10-MW project ?n th? w?rks ?ith a South Carolina utility ?ntil the utility contracted f?r 100 MW with a hyperscaling A? company.

Hyperscalers ?nclude the w?rld’s biggest technology companies t??t operate massive global networks ?f data centers ?nd cloud infrastructure.

?hile t?? financial details of the AI data center deal were unclear, Gerasymovych ?aid t?e company he ?as up aga?nst had billions of dollars ?f capital t? play w?th.

“For them, it’s about speed to market and they’re just throwing money around,” he s?id. “What is there to compete with?”

(Reporting ?y Laila Kearney ?nd Mrinalika Roy Editing b? Marguerita Choy)