Crypto mining can help energy volatility, Paradigm responds to policy onslaught

Policymakers across North America are worrying about what the energy usage of crypto, artificial intelligence and other data centers might mean for the affordability of regular customers, but crypto investment firm Paradigm argues that the government should leave bitcoin mining operations out of it.

Mining bitcoin does take a tremendous amount of electricity. But the business model only works when that energy is particularly cheap — such as when it's provided by off-peak renewable sources — and can be given back at the times when it's most needed by the public, according to a report produced by Paradigm, which has miner Genesis Digital Assets in its investment portfolio.

The report, viewed by CoinDesk, disputes widely shared claims about bitcoin mining's energy use and waste issues by citing data that the sector actually uses about 0.23% of global energy and emits about 0.08% of the carbon. And the miners have to operate under a "break even price" per megawatt hour of electricity to enable profits.

"This means that by its very nature, Bitcoin mining counter-balances the bulk of the average community’s energy consumption, bringing equilibrium to the grid — not strain," according to the report compiled by Justin Slaughter, vice president for regulatory affairs at Paradigm, and Veronica Irwin. "It is, in a word, bringing balance to our energy force."

Federal and state policy efforts are beginning to pile up that would seek to restrict data centers and digital mining operations, which could arguably fit under the "data center" definition in U.S. law. On Thursday, U.S. Senators Richard Blumenthal, a Connecticut Democrat, and Josh Hawley, a Missouri Republican, introduced a bill to stop data centers from pushing up electricity costs for consumers, though the legislative text doesn't explicitly mention bitcoin or crypto. New York state lawmakers have similarly been pursuing a data-center moratorium.

"Artificial intelligence (AI) and cryptomining are fueling a rising demand for energy driven by massive, energy-intensive data centers," several Democratic U.S. senators wrote in a November letter to the chief of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission that asked for "immediate action" to protect consumers.

In Canada, British Columbia said in October it planned to halt new crypto mining operations from its energy grid.

The Paradigm report countered, "Bitcoin miners who use energy that would otherwise go to waste, or who participate in state-led programs to give energy control agencies more control over the grid, should be rewarded for their good behavior."