- The Canadian Province of British Columbia announced that it would halt onboarding new crypto miners into its region.
- BC Hydro and the government cited the lack of jobs and the heavy electricity drainage by the heavily powered crypto mining computers.
- The suspension is set to last 18 months before a solution benefits the people and industries within the province.
The Canadian province of British Columbia has issued a law to halt the registration for crypto mining, stating that it could have dire consequences on its people and green energy.
On December 21, the state-owned electricity provider, BC Hydro, announced that it would be suspending the requests for connections by new crypto miners in the region, citing many problems with the 24/7/365 usage of electricity by crypto miners in the province. The Canadian province imposed an 18 months suspension on the connection and registration of new crypto miners.
“To preserve British Columbia’s supply of clean electricity to support the Province’s climate action and economic goals, BC Hydro will suspend electricity connection requests from cryptocurrency mining operations for 18 months,” the press release reads.
The news was spread with the promise of the government and BC Hydro working towards a future where they could accommodate the vast amount of electricity drained by the powerful crypto-mining computers. It is expected that within 18 months of the connection suspension, BC Hydro will have developed a framework to balance the need for electricity by the citizens and the businesses in the region.
Presently, the state-owned electricity provider offers services to seven crypto mining firms as six more crypto miners are nearly integrated into the Canadian province’s system. This calculation totals 273 megawatts, although the request of new crypto miners for connection to British Columbia’s electricity will be rejected.
“Currently, 21 projects are requesting a total of 1,403 megawatts that will be temporarily suspended,” British Columbia said.
The Minister of Energy, Mines and Low Carbon Innovation, Josie Osborne, had mentioned the reason for the government’s decision to halt crypto mining in the Canadian Province of British Columbia.
“Cryptocurrency mining consumes massive amounts of electricity to run and cool banks of high-powered computers 24/7/365 while creating very few jobs in the local economy,” the Minister said.
The Canadian province feared it would record high losses if it continued accepting requests from new crypto miners into its region. It was explained that should the intense electricity usage by crypto miners be allowed, the megawatts to be used by the additional 21 miners requesting connection would be 1,403 megawatts, equivalent to powering 570,000 houses or 2.1 million electric vehicles annually within the province.
The province could not afford this risk, especially since accepting new miners to utilize the region’s electricity could be disastrous for its people. The government believes that by suspending the connection of cryptocurrency miners, electricity would then be tolerable for the people and industries that rely on BC Hydro.
“We are suspending electricity connection requests from cryptocurrency operations to preserve our electricity supply for people…,” the statement reads.
British Columbia expressed that if the condition was ” unchecked, much of BC Hydro’s available energy used in supporting the province’s objective of clean energy could be destroyed by cryptocurrency mining projects, “with little remaining to electrify projects that have greater jobs, economic development, and greenhouse gas reduction benefits.”
Fortunately, the Canadian province of British Columbia had mentioned that it would not be halting all cryptocurrency mining within but only those that are relatively new to the process of mining and are still in the process of registering. The few crypto miners already operating within the province can continue their operations.
At the end of the statement, British Columbia noted that the Manitoba government had also taken a similar route back in November by restricting new connections to its electricity grid for crypto mining. After the suspension of crypto mining, new regulations drafted by Hydro-Quebec, a public corporation that oversees the distribution of electricity in Quebec, were set in place, which saw an increase in rates for cryptocurrency mining.
Conclusion
The recent law placed by the British Columbia government is aimed towards securing electricity for the people living in its region as the connection of more crypto mining firms to its electricity grid could prove harmful to the province and its economy in the long run.
