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Iceland’s power company has turned away new bitcoin miners
A scarcity of power in Iceland has led to the country’s national power company, Landsvirkjun, turning away new Bitcoin miners. Landsvirkjun has not entertained requests from new customers for buying energy to mine cryptocurrency. Cryptocurrency mining enterprises have been a new addition to Iceland’s economic landscape. These enterprises were attracted by the low cost of power required to mine new cryptocurrencies. That apart, Landsvirkjun has also cut to several industrial customers, such as aluminium smelters and data centres. According to the company, the factors that led to the reduction in supply were low hydro reservoir levels, a power station malfunction, and a delay in acquiring power from an outside producer.
Even huge demand played a part in the reduction in power supply, Tinna Traustadottir, executive vice president of sales and customer service at Landsvirkjun, told Bloomberg.
For a long time, many crypto miners have been attracted to the country due to its abundance of geothermal energy. The miners harvest this to create a cheap and plentiful supply of renewable energy. Companies that have set up shop in Iceland include Canada-based Hive Blockchain Technologies Ltd., Hong Kong-based Genesis Mining Ltd., and Bitfury Holding BV.
According to Landsvirkjun, all requests for power from new customers mining cryptocurrency were turned down as on December 7. Iceland’s availability of geothermal energy, which is harnessed to generate a cheap supply of renewable energy, has attracted crypto mining businesses since a long time.
This isn’t the first time that Bitcoin mining operations have been questioned around the world. Two of Sweden’s director generals recently proposed banning crypto mining to meet climate obligations. Then, back in September 2021, the government in China imposed a blanket ban on all forms of cryptocurrency trading.
The price of the world’s oldest and largest cryptocurrency has climbed by about 80 percent in 2021. The value of Bitcoin reached an all-time high of over $68,000 in November.
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