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Plattsburgh, New York has imposed an 18-month moratorium on Bitcoin mining

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Re: Plattsburgh, New York has imposed an 18-month moratorium on Bitcoin mining

#3

If it's just Bitcoin named in the bylaw, what's to stop the mining enterprises from switching to mining another cryptocurrency?

https://www.cityofplattsburgh-ny.gov/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=22...

The law itself says, “cryptocurrency”:

>A LOCAL LAW IMPOSING A MORATORIUM ON COMMERCIAL CRYPTOCURRENCY MINING OPERATIONS IN THE CITY OF PLATTSBURGH

Re: Plattsburgh, New York has imposed an 18-month moratorium on Bitcoin mining

#6
So the truth is that people are using electric heaters instead of gas/oil based heating systems, and they are somehow blaming it on bitcoin mining?

Also shouldn't the law be written to specify any electricity usage over a certain wattage? I don't know anything about Plattsburg, NY but why would a local factory that uses 100 megawatts be more "allowed" to use electricity than a bitcoin miner?

What if the bitcoin miner (or any high-wattage business) sets up their own 1 MW solar array?

If the city has power deals that is bad for itself, why punish its residents with a law like this?

Re: Plattsburgh, New York has imposed an 18-month moratorium on Bitcoin mining

#9
After reading the article, I'm going to have to agree with the city. I would strongly encourage anyone who disagrees to read the article as well. They're not banning bitcoin mining, they're exempting commercial bitcoin miners from a cut-rate electricity deal designed to draw in industrial operations like factories.

Basically the city gives extremely cheap power to factories and other industrial enterprises in exchange for them hiring employees and generating revenue for the city. This was written overly broad, miners moved in and took advantage of it, and now the city is realizing their mistake and temporarily changing the wording of the law while they determine how to fix it long-term. Existing operations are not impacted, just new ones.

I think the disagreement here is the headline is just super shitty. They didn't ban bitcoin mining, they stopped subsidizing extremely cheap electricity for commercial bitcoin mining operations. Big difference.

Re: Plattsburgh, New York has imposed an 18-month moratorium on Bitcoin mining

#10

So the truth is that people are using electric heaters instead of gas/oil based heating systems, and they are somehow blaming it on bitcoin mining? Also shouldn't the law be written to specify any electricity usage over a certain wattage? I don't know anything about Plattsburg, NY but why would a local factory that uses 100 megawatts be more "allowed" to use electricity than a bitcoin miner? What if the bitcoin miner…

It sounds like a bandaid to paper over a poorly-conceived program of incentives while they work out something more permanent. They were using their power plant as a loss-leader to attract industry. Which explains why the local factory is "more allowed;" it's presumably because they expect the factory to generate more jobs and tax revenue than the bitcoin miner.
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