Murphy's law comes for bitmining

Jul 12, 2022 View in browser   By Sam Sutton and Debra Kahn THE BIG IDEA Bitcoin mining is going bust. | Ted Shaffrey/AP Photo BIT OF A BUST — The bitcoin mining boom is going bust. Rising interest rates, crashing crypto prices and sky-high energy costs have thrown the once white-hot industry on ice. That might be a good thing for the environment, in the long term — but in the short term, it could hurt the industry's efforts to make itself more sustainable. Share prices of publicly-traded mining companies — which financial institutions had used as a way to get investment exposure to Bitcoin — have fallen by more than half since last fall to around $20,000 per token. Some operators are dumping Bitcoin to pay off loans and keep their operations afloat, further depressing the price of a digital commodity they'd spent years amassing. As if that weren't enough, extreme weather events over the last month are forcing bitcoin mining companies to shut down rigs in both Southern Montana and majorcrypto mining hubs in Texas. "It feels almost like Murphy's law has come into play for a lot of Bitcoin miners over the last few months," said Charlie Schumacher , vice president of communications at the publicly traded mining firm Marathon Digital. The collapse — accelerated by a credit crisis that's ensnared major crypto lending platforms and a prominent digital hedge fund — has come right after the industry's massive electricity use (on par with all of Belgium, according to the University of Cambridge) started drawing attention in Congress and in state capitals. In response to threats by New York state lawmakers andthe EPA to crack down on carbon-based mining operations, the industry started spotlighting projects that link rigs to new solar or wind farms. Miners also started attaching their operations to oil wells, powering their machines with natural gas that's usually burned off as a drilling byproduct. Those projects are expensive, however, and with energy prices skyrocketing, Schumacher said it's likely that some crypto miners will put sustainability projects on the backburner as they scramble for cheap alternatives to keep their computers humming. "For the mining world, we're all very interested in moving more toward renewables, but you have to keep the lights on first — make sure you're stable — and then work toward building that more sustainable system," he said. "We're all interested in moving that direction, but you have to make sure you survive first." Bill Cannon , who heads portfolio management for exchange-traded funds at the digital asset investment firm Valkyrie, said that he hopes the industry's growing ties with power generators and energy companies can help convince policymakers that Bitcoin mining can be a useful tool for stabilizing the grid. In the near term, though, the downturn could hurt those efforts. "It's obvious that it will hurt them," he said. "Obviously, they would like to sell [Bitcoin] at $30,000 as opposed to $20,000."   INTRODUCING POWER SWITCH: The energy landscape is profoundly transforming. Power Switch is a daily newsletter that unlocks the most important stories driving the energy sector and the political forces shaping critical decisions about your energy future, from production to storage, distribution to consumption. Don't miss out on Power Switch, your guide to the politics of energy transformation in America and around the world. SUBSCRIBE TODAY.     CORPORATE PROMISES SICK PATIENT — Hospitals are getting into the sustainability game, Ariel Wittenberg reports for POLITICO's E&E News. The U.S. health care sector is responsible for 8.5 percent of the nation's greenhouse gas emissions, and some industry leaders say that just as doctors take the Hippocratic oath to "do no harm" to human patients, they should do the same for the planet. Kaiser Permanente became the nation's first carbon-neutral health care system in 2020 and is working toward net-zero by 2050, including its Scope 3 emissions. The reductions have come from some unexpected places: Disinfectant wipes, for example, used to come in large plastic canisters, akin to how Lysol disinfectant wipes are sold in grocery stores. After speaking with its supplier, Kaiser now purchases disinfectant wipes that are stored in soft plastic wrap, similar to how baby wipes are stored. The seemingly insignificant change actually comes with big climate impacts. The supplier can now transport as many wipes in one truckload as it had previously carried in six or seven. The Seattle Children's Hospital has phased out the use of an anesthetic called desflurane that has more than 3,714 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide and lasts 14 years in the atmosphere. "We need a healthy planet for healthy people," said Michael Bigelow, Seattle Children's Hospital's sustainability manager. Read more from Ariel here. BUILDING BLOCKS UKRAINE GAMBIT — Ukraine lost a round over the weekend in its war with Russia — at the hands of Canada, which couldn't hold out on shipping a key component to help deliver Russian gas to Germany, POLITICO's Sarah Wheaton reports. The question of whether to grant an exception to sanctions on Russia in order to fix the Nord Stream 1 pipeline saw Canada torn between the demands of Germany, which remains dependent on Russian fuel, and Ukraine's pleas to cut Russian revenue streams. Ukrainian Energy Minister German Galushchenko urged the Canadian government not to exempt the component from sanctions last month, according to a letter obtained by POLITICO. But Canadian officials cited threats to the German economy and risks that Germans will be "unable to heat their homes as winter approaches" without the gas supply in announcing their decision to let Siemens ship the turbines from Montreal to Germany. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy decried the move on Monday, POLITICO's America Hernandez and Victor Jack report . "The decision on the exception to sanctions will be perceived in Moscow exclusively as a manifestation of weakness," he said. "There can be no doubt that Russia will try not just to limit as much as possible, but to completely shut down the supply of gas to Europe at the most acute moment." That's what analysts are predicting, too, as a result of Europe's inability so far to pivot away from Russian supplies. "Gas is obviously the card that the Kremlin has," said Alexander Gabuev, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Read more from America and Jack here. Home on the range? | Photo courtesy of the Bureau of Land Management. SOLAR VS. GAME — Conflicts between solar farms and wildlife are still very much a thing, as Jason Plautz reports for E&E News. Pronghorn antelope are having their migration patterns altered by Wyoming's Sweetwater Solar farm, which came online in 2019. A recent study found that the antelope lost as much as 12 percent of their average summer range and 10 percent of their average winter range to the project. "It's sort of shocking the level of impact solar facilities have compared to other generation facilities," said Jon Holst , wildlife and senior energy adviser for the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership. "Even wind as another renewable energy opportunity allows for some wildlife movement. Solar has these high-fenced facilities, the vegetation is removed, some of them are leveled and graveled. You're talking about complete habitat removal." The U.S. Department of Energy's Solar Futures Study predicts that solar deployment will have to reach 1,600 gigawatts alternating current by 2050 to achieve a zero-carbon grid, requiring installations to go at four times the current deployment rate between 2025 and 2030. And the Bureau of Land Management is stepping up approvals of solar projects on federal land accordingly. State officials aren't seeing it as zero-sum, though. They're trying to work with project developers at the planning stage so they can find a new location or redesign fencing to better accommodate species. "We try to think of this as a way to incentivize sustainable development rather than penalizing developers," said Angi Bruce, deputy director of the Wyoming Game and Fish Department. "We're gearing up to keep working with solar, and our track record shows we'll be taking this very seriously to support the energy sector." Read more from Jason here.   STEP INSIDE THE WEST WING: What's really happening in West Wing offices? Find out who's up, who's down, and who really has the president's ear in our West Wing Playbook newsletter, the insider's guide to the Biden White House and Cabinet. For buzzy nuggets and details that you won't find anywhere else, subscribe today.     YOU TELL US Welcome to the Long Game, your source for news on how companies and governments are shaping our future. Team Sustainability is editor Greg Mott, deputy editor Debra Kahn and reporters Lorraine Woellert and Jordan Wolman. Reach us all at gmott@politico.com, dkahn@politico.com, lwoellert@politico.com and jwolman@politico.com. Want more? Don't we all. Sign up for the Long Game. Four days a week and still free! WHAT WE'RE CLICKING — Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo thinks state-level abortion bans will have a "quite significant" effect on businesses that don't choose to relocate. — Dutch farmers are becoming increasingly confrontational in their opposition to government efforts to cut pollution. — A nonprofit is transforming a former California golf course into a habitat for endangered salmon and other wildlife.   Follow us on Twitter Debra Kahn @debra_kahn Greg Mott @gwmott Lorraine Woellert @Woellert Jordan Wolman @jordanwolman   Follow us

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