After the catastrophic winter storm in Texas in December 2022, Bitcoin miners supplied the system with up to 1,500 megawatts of electricity, which was sufficient to light more than 1.5 million modest houses.
Due to the adaptability of mining operations and the supplementary services offered by state authorities, this remarkable accomplishment was made feasible. A “bomb cyclone” unleashed high temperatures in the days before Christmas, rendering millions of Americans without electricity and taking hundreds of lives.
According to research that Cointelegraph first reported today, on December 24–25, 2022, there was a 30% decline in the hash rate of all Bitcoins mined worldwide. Nevertheless, Texas miners showed excellent participation in the ancillary services offered by the state, which encourages consumers to minimize their use during periods of high demand in order to stabilize the grid.
In order to guarantee that miners have the tools required to enable grid balancing effectively, software suppliers have also started collaborating with miners. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas devised a temporary procedure in March 2022 to make it easier to attach new big loads, including Bitcoin miners, to the ERCOT grid.
Texas is among the top states in the US for Bitcoin mining, along with New York (19.9%), Kentucky (18.7%), and Georgia (17.3%), with a share of the Bitcoin hash rate of 14%. The efforts made by Bitcoin miners during the winter storm show the industry’s capacity to spur economic growth and offer crucial support in dire situations.