🌨️ Winter Storms Affect Bitcoin Hash Rate

Freezing temperatures across different regions in the U.S. put a strain on some of the nation’s electricity grid. How does this affect crypto? Bitcoin hash rate temporarily fell by 38% due to these freezing temperatures. Let’s take a closer look to see why.

• The top four Bitcoin mining operations in the U.S. include Texas, New York, Kentucky, and Georgia. All of these areas experienced power outages due to the winter storm. Miners either could not mine or voluntarily suspended operations to give power back to the grid.
• The Bitcoin network has since returned to 241.29 EH/s after a 38% fall to 170.60 EH/s according to data from the hash rate mining calculator, CoinWarz.
• These events prompted the question regarding centralized mining and whether some natural events could halt or alter the efficiency of cryptocurrency. CEO of Bitcoin advocacy group, Dennis Porter, said that despite roughly 30% of Bitcoin’s hash rate in the U.S. going offline, the network “[continued] to work perfectly.“

Though 30% of Bitcoin’s hash rate (in the U.S.) was offline, it should be noted and celebrated that bitcoin continued to be used efficiently. Porter commended bitcoin and further said to imagine what would happen “if Amazon or Google turned off 1/3 of their data centers.” While the drop in hash rate may be daunting, this should further show the efficiency of crypto and the blockchain when faced with strenuous conditions.