During the December 2022 winter storm in Texas, bitcoin mining operators (BTC) returned up to 1,500 megawatts of power to the distressed local grid. It was possible thanks to the flexibility of mining operations and auxiliary services, provided by state authorities.
In his comment to the Satoshi Action Fund, Texas Blockchain Council President Lee Bratcher stated that miners returned as much as 1,500 megawatts to the Texas grid. This amount of energy would be enough to heat “over 1.5 million small homes or keep 300 large hospitals fully operational.”according to the calculations of the bitcoin advocacy group.
Although there is no specification on the exact period of time in which the miners have accumulated such an amount of energy, the global bitcoin mining hash rate dropped 30% on December 24 and 25, 2022. Miners appeared to be the model participants for ancillary services in the state, which encourages customers to reduce their consumption during peak demand in order to stabilize the network.
The winter storm in North America was so severe that Shut Down Binance Cloud Mining Products from December 24 to 26. In the days leading up to Christmas, a “bomb cyclone” unleashed extreme temperatures across the United States, leaving millions without power and claiming dozens of lives..
In March 2022, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) established a provisional process to ensure that new big payloads such as bitcoin miners can connect to the ERCOT network. Software vendors have also started working with miners to ensure they have the necessary tools to properly enable grid balancing.
With its 14% bitcoin hash rate share, Texas is in in between top states for bitcoin mining in usaalong with New York (19.9%), Kentucky (18.7%) and Georgia (17.3%).
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