Staff works at the Emegix data center, which is one of the largest bitcoin mines in the world, in Ekibastus, Kazakhstan on January 3, 2023.
The reference to “Biden’s hatred of bitcoin” stems from a policy proposal floated by the White House in May 2023 for a. This tax would have generated revenue to offset the downsides of the hugely energy-intensive computations needed to generate bitcoin, a process known as “mining.” Mining firms deploy vast arrays of custom-built servers, continuously vying to crack the cryptographic code that unlocks new bitcoins.
In other words, more cryptocurrency means more power plants, which means more fossil fuel infrastructure, production and exports. And that’s energy dominance. As for the argument that cryptocurrencies drive the development of new energy infrastructure, there’s already no shortage of reasons to increase generation capacity. Electric vehicles, heat pumps, increased manufacturing and AI data centers are just a few of the additional loads on the grid that will incentivize new transmission lines and power plants of all kinds.