Kazakhstan authorities propose restricting miners to address electricity shortages

In Kazakhstan, electricity consumption rose by 7% year on year due to data centres engaged in cryptocurrency mining, said Energy Minister Magzum Mirzagaliyev, Kazakhstan Today reports.

He proposed giving Kazakhstan’s system operator, KEGOC, the authority to limit the energy consumption of mining data centres in the event of electricity shortages.

The minister noted that authorities intend to regulate the issuance of technical conditions for energy capacity.

Magzum Mirzagaliyev stressed that the country intends to develop the mining industry through the development of renewable energy sources (RES):

“If there is demand from miners for the corresponding electricity, it can be satisfied by building new generation capacity using RES.”

The Ministry of Energy has already prepared proposals related to temporarily suspending the connection of mining data centres to energy sources and limiting the energy consumption of operating mining farms.

“We plan that in the next five years we will build new stations with generation of around 3,000 MW. These are quite large volumes; they will help offset all possible risks. I am talking about 3,000 MW of gas generation alone,” said Mirzagaliyev.

New renewable energy capacity is also planned.

As reported earlier, amid tightening rhetoric by Chinese authorities toward the crypto industry, several companies turned their attention to Kazakhstan as a jurisdiction for relocating miners.

Bitmain, BIT Mining Limited and other companies, The9 and Wattum invested in data centres in Kazakhstan.

In June, President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev signed a law introducing an additional mining tax. Experts told ForkLog how this will affect the development of the mining industry in the country.

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