New cryptocurrency mining farms looking to request electricity hook ups will be suspended in order to “preserve” the provinces power supply and support its “climate action” and economic goals citing there wouldn’t be enough power for future electric vehicles and new housing units.
According to a statement from the Ministry of Energy, Mine and Low Carbon Innovation, 21 cryptocurrency projects are asking for 1,403 megawatts in total, which is enough to power 2.1 million electric vehicles or roughly 570,000 households annually.
The B.C. government and B.C. Hydro says they will have time during the 18-month suspension to consult with the sector and First Nations as a permanent framework for bitcoin operations is built, according to the statement.
According to the statement from Energy Minister Josie Osborne, bitcoin mining creates “relatively few jobs” for the economy while consuming “huge amounts of electricity” by continuously running banks of powerful computers.
Almost all of British Columbia’s electricity (87%) comes from hydro electric power, the province says that cryptocurrency miners have shown “unprecedented interest” in the region.
Seven cryptocurrency mining operations that are now in operation and six further projects that are well along in the connecting process will not be impacted by the suspension, the statement says.
However, it claims that if new connections were allowed to proceed “unchecked,” energy that would otherwise be used to support the province’s CleanBC goals might be depleted, leaving little electricity available for initiatives that would have a greater positive impact on the economy, the environment, and employment.
The ending of 2022, a project in North Vancouver is supposed to be online for bitcoin mining and recovering most of the energy to pump out residential and industrial heating. The project is with MintGreen Co in partnership with Lonsdale Energy Corp
A project that has been set to begin supplying heat to North Vancouver residents from a bitcoin mining farm is online and pumping heat. According to Coin Desk the “digital boilers” recover 96% of their energy costs in heating.
2.1 million electric vehicles are not hitting the streets in B.C. anytime soon. There is currently an electric vehicle shortage predicted to last several years. EV’s are also out of the price range for the majority of residents in British Columbia.
B.C. electric vehicle purchasers would be required to take on more unaffordable debt when the majority of residents already can’t keep up with living costs.
B.C. has been experiencing a massive housing shortage for close to a decade. In 2021 only 53,189 new home starts were registered in British Columbia which is a far cry from 570,000 households that could possibly be using the energy instead of a crypto mining farm.
The new hydro electric power generating dam called Site C has been hit with delay after delay from the government and environmental activists for several years since the BC NDP became the governing party of B.C. The delays have caused the project costs to balloon to $16 billion up from a price tag of $10.7 billion.
Site C project was started in 2015 and the completion has been pushed all the way out to November 2025 when it will be fully in-service, according to B.C. Hydro.
It will provide 1,100 megawatts (MW) of capacity, and produce about 5,100 gigawatt hours (GWh) of electricity each year — enough energy to power the equivalent of about 450,000 homes or 1.7 million electric vehicles per year in British Columbia.