Cryptocurrency mining in Kazakhstan has taken the form of a national disaster

KEGOC, the operator of Kazakhstan’s power grids, has decided to limit the number of mining farms in the country: permits will be issued to only 50 registered organizations. They will be supplied with energy at an increased tariff, and they will be officially turned off first of all in case of interruptions in the country’s energy system. But what to do with thousands of “gray” miners, the authorities do not yet know.

Mining in Kazakhstan in the second half of 2021 led to a real disaster – due to the irrepressible consumption of electricity, six regions faced massive blackouts, and three power plants almost failed due to increased load. Instead of the planned 1-2% increase in energy consumption was 8% at once, so there is simply not enough generating capacity. According to the most conservative estimates, the share of “gray” miners accounts for 1200 MW, but there are also officially operating mining farms.

To understand the scale of the problem, according to the Financial Times, 87,849 “energy-intensive” mining installations were transported from China to Kazakhstan. However, now many are idle – for example, Xive announced that it could not find energy sources for 2500 installations and was forced to stop mining. The same registered organizations that will continue to work, from next year will pay a compensation fee of 1 tenge for each kilowatt of energy consumed. But this will not solve the problem – the Kazakh authorities are considering the construction of a nuclear power plant to increase national generation.