Nebraska to Make Bitcoin Mining More Difficult With a New Bill

Nebraska’s state legislature just unanimously passed a bill that slightly restricts Bitcoin mining. It doesn’t impose any serious limits, but introduces new requirements, handicaps, and added costs to mining firms.

The bill isn’t a big setback, but the unanimous vote is still noteworthy. Marathon is the only mining firm with significant operations in the state, and its reaction to these events could prove insightful.

Nebraska to Restrict Bitcoin Mining

Crypto regulation is sweeping all across America, as President Trump has made it a hot-button issue at both the state and federal levels. Generally, the Republican Party is more pro-crypto, but it’s also full of internal contradictions.

A great example of these is in Nebraska, where a 2/3 majority GOP legislature unanimously voted to restrict Bitcoin mining today:

“The Nebraska Legislature just passed a bill to regulate Bitcoin miners. LB 526 requires large miners to cover the cost of infrastructure upgrades, requires miners to report energy usage, and permits authorities to interrupt service. The bill passed unanimously 49-0,” a crypto policy watchdog claimed.

LB 526, Nebraska’s Bitcoin mining bill, isn’t a huge setback for companies in the state. It’s just over two pages long and pretty straightforward.

Unlike anti-mining bills, it doesn’t address carbon emissions or other environmental impacts. Instead, it is almost entirely focused on the electrical grid.

Over the last few years, mining operations in Texas have been blamed for brownouts and outages. These firms use huge amounts of electricity, which can strain the grid during a summer heatwave. Texas’ firmly Republican legislature passed bills harshly restricting mining, and Nebraska may be taking the same approach.

Specifically, the state of Nebraska reserves the right to interrupt mining operations at its own discretion, which could potentially address the heat wave issue.

It also mandates that mining firms pay for infrastructure upgrades if their business strains the existing grid. Finally, the number of mining operations and the amount of electricity they consume will be publicly reported.

Now that the state legislature has passed the bill unanimously, it only requires the Governor’s signature to become law. Nebraska Governor Jim Pillen called crypto an “important, emerging industry,” but he hasn’t commented on mining specifically. At the moment, it seems rather likely that he will ultimately sign.

So far, Marathon is the only Bitcoin mining firm with significant Nebraska operations. Earlier this year, it upgraded hardware at its site in Kearney, a county with 6,600 people. US Bitcoin mining is becoming less profitable, and Marathon is taking on debt to purchase BTC from other sources.

In other words, Marathon’s reaction to the bill could prove insightful. Even if LB 526 does become law, it doesn’t actually restrict Bitcoin mining in Nebraska much.

Still, this development does signify that the local government is very willing to impose light restrictions. That alone makes the incident noteworthy.