Irkutsk Region Entrepreneurs Push for Special Tariffs for Miners

The Irkutsk regional association of employers “Partnership of Manufacturers and Entrepreneurs” sent to the local tariff service a proposal to develop special electricity prices for miners. This was reported by TASS with reference to the decree.

The document says that in the last four years the growth in electricity consumption in the region has not kept pace with the growth in the number of consumers. The highest figures for this indicator are recorded in villages and dachas near Irkutsk.

One of the reasons for the situation is residents of private homes mining cryptocurrencies; miners pay for electricity at rates approved for households.

“This creates an additional burden for industrial and agricultural enterprises burdened by cross-subsidisation. According to expert estimates, they are forced to compensate miners’ electricity costs by about 700 million rubles a year,” the decree says.

In light of this, the entrepreneurs proposed designing and approving differentiated electricity tariffs according to the level of consumption for private individuals engaged in cryptocurrency mining.

Earlier, Governor Igor Kobzev of Irkutsk Oblast wrote a letter to Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak that in 2021 electricity consumption by residents in the region would be 159% higher than the previous year’s figures. He linked this to “shadow” miners.

Kobzev also proposed legally fixing cryptocurrency mining as a form of entrepreneurship. Anatoly Aksakov, head of the State Duma Committee on the Financial Market, who had previously advocated a similar initiative, said there was a need to spell out the taxation procedure for miners.

In the Ministry of Energy, Russia, there are discussions to exclude miners from consuming electricity under reduced household tariffs.

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