Proposals to incorporate a city in Texas’ Hood County so that it could regulate the noise created by a local Bitcoin mining site were rejected by voters this week.
It’s a setback for residents who have complained about the noise generated by the miner MARA (NASDAQ: MARA), built in 2022. According to reports citing the MARA website, the Grandbury, Texas site is home to 60,000 computers dedicated to mining Bitcoin; however, at the time of writing, the MARA website no longer contains such granular details.
According to locals, the industrial fans used to cool the site have created a perpetual, roar-like buzz which has destroyed the quiet peace of the community. In reporting by The Texas Tribune, locals have compared the noise to a ‘leafblower that never turns off’ and complain of sleepless nights, headaches, and hearing problems.
Under current laws, residents are powerless to do anything about it. Texas counties like Hood County, which houses the site, have no authority to enforce noise limits, which is part of why the State has become such an attractive option for mining operations like MARAs. Additionally, State authorities have taken further steps to make Texas the destination of choice for miners, introducing tax breaks and utilizing its abundant open land to recruit businesses looking to establish a presence.
In October, a group of residents hatched a plan: incorporate a new city (to be named Mitchell Bend, named after a local road), which would be legally allowed to create noise ordinances that would force MARA to reduce its decibel output.
The proposal appeared on the local election ballot earlier this week and was effectively put to the 250 registered voters in Hood County.
The proposal failed, with 138 votes cast: 86 (62.32%) were against, while 52 (37.68%) were in favor.
The rejection of the proposal isn’t simply a referendum on the site itself, however. According to The Texas Tribune, while many locals live in Hood County for the quiet of rural life, they also reside there to escape city regulations. The proposal would have naturally been seen as a red flag by those residents.
A written statement provided by MARA, which had unsuccessfully tried to get a court to block the proposal’s inclusion on the ballot, said:
“We’re pleased that Hood County voters saw through the sham incorporation effort and rejected it at the ballot box. As we’ve said from the start, this was an unlawful attempt to weaponize municipal incorporation against law-abiding businesses like MARA.”
A private nuisance lawsuit against MARA (Citizens Concerned About Wolf Hollow v Marathon Digital Holdings) is still in the early stages in Texas.
Noise from digital asset miners risks becoming a fraught political issue for President Donald Trump, whose rural base is among those most likely to be affected by the administration’s push to make the U.S. the world’s digital asset miner.
According to the BBC, there were “at least” 137 Bitcoin mining sites across 21 U.S. states, and estimates by the US Energy Information Administration put the energy usage of these sites at up to 2.3% of the national grid.
Watch: Can Bitcoin Mining Actually Help the Environment?
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Source: https://coingeek.com/texans-latest-attempts-to-fight-bitcoin-mining-noise-fails/
