Not a quiet little town

EVERY NIGHT, THE NURSE ANESTHETIST Cheryl Shadden lies awake in her home in Granbury, Texas, listening to a nonstop roar. “It’s like sitting on the runway of an airport where jets are taking off, one after another,” she says. “You can’t speak to somebody five feet away and have them hear you at all.”

The noise comes from a nearby bitcoin-mining operation, which set up shop at a power plant in Granbury last year. Since then, residents in the surrounding area have complained to public officials about an incessant din that they say keeps them awake, gives them migraines, and apparently has scared off wildlife. “My citizens are suffering,” says Hood County Constable John Shirley.

Rural America has not shared much in the wealth of the tech boom or, in areas without broadband, even much of the tech. But the impacts of bitcoin mining—an energy-intensive process that powers and protects cryptocurrency—are distinctly negative for many residents: noise, carbon pollution, and higher utility bills. Some 34 large-scale bitcoin mines operate across the U.S., according to the New York Times.And despite high-profile crypto collapses in 2022, mining companies last year expanded operations to cash in on a rebound. One study said global energy consumption for mining doubled.

BITCOIN ISso energy-intensive because it relies on a process known as proof-of-work. Rather than being overseen by a single authority, like a central bank, bitcoin disperses the responsibility of the network’s integrity to voluntary “miners” around the globe, who prevent tampering through a complex cryptographic process that consumes a vast amount of energy. Texas has become a global industry leader because miners can access cheap energy and land there, and benefit from friendly tax laws and regulation. Bitcoin miners consume about 2,100 megawatts of the state’s power supplies, an amount that can power hundreds of thousands of homes. Companies like Riot Platforms and Marathon Digital Holdings have recently expanded in the state. (Other states have pushed back: in 2022, New York imposed a moratorium on bitcoin mining over environmental concerns.)

Bitcoin-mining plants, like data centers, run massive cooling fans to keep their computers from overheating. The rumble from the Granbury plant reached Shannon Wolf in her home eight miles away; she thought it was a nearby train. “It has woken me from a dead sleep before,” she says. Other residents of the