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In the News: Inside Climate News May 10, 2025

New York Bitcoin Miners Are Buying Up Power Plants — and Communities Are Fighting Back

Mandy DeRoche, Deputy Managing Attorney, Clean Energy Program: “Crypto mines exploit all of the distributed impacts in a way that has made it really hard to regulate and hard for communities to understand. I don’t think most communities realize what they’re inviting into their community until it’s too late. With the water consumption, the fire…

In the News: The Guardian May 4, 2025

How Trump’s love for crypto threatens U.S. residents’ peace: ‘I just want quiet’

Mandy DeRoche, Deputy Managing Attorney, Clean Energy Program, Earthjustice: “If there are policies that support increased mining, there’s going to be more pollution and more community impacts.”

In the News: Capital & Main April 30, 2025

Fracking-Powered Crypto Mine in Pennsylvania Shuts Down Without Word to Regulators

Charles McPhedran, Attorney, Clean Energy Program: “Diversified must not be allowed to walk away and leave others to clean up its mess.”

In the News: The New Republic March 17, 2025

What It’s Like to Live in a Small Town Polluted by a Cryptomine

Mandy DeRoche, Deputy Managing Attorney, Clean Energy Program: “This is going to mean increased impacts on local communities that we’ve seen across the country.”

In the News: The Allegheny Front March 13, 2025

Crypto mining company agrees to speed cleanup of its coal ash pile

Charles McPhedran, Attorney, Clean Energy Program: “The idea was that the coal ash would be parked there for a little while while it cooled, and then it would be taken to a (permanent) disposal area. It overflowed fences. It overflowed into a ditch with water on it running off the site … it just became…

The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection took this photo of the waste coal ash pile at the Scrubgrass Power Plant, in Kennerdell, Venango County.
Press Release: Victory March 7, 2025

Scrubgrass Cryptomining Facility to Expedite Removal of Toxic Coal Ash ‘Mountain’

Unpermitted massive coal ash pile growing for years near the Allegheny River will now be removed by next year, preventing contamination

In the News: CNN March 3, 2025

Keep the lights on or mine Bitcoin? How crypto is starting to suck up clean energy

Mandy DeRoche, Deputy Managing Attorney, Clean Energy Program: “If you use all that cheap, clean hydro(power) for crypto mining, then humans and small businesses can’t use it and then they have to go somewhere else for that energy — and often it is fossil fuel-based.”

The Greenidge Generating Station on the west shore of Seneca Lake, near Dresden, New York.
(Lauren Petracca for Earthjustice)
From the Experts February 21, 2025

How much do we subsidize cryptocurrency mining’s electricity use? No one knows.

Crypto mines have raised electricity rates for households while receiving big discounts and subsidies.

People walk through the hallways at Equinix Data Center in Ashburn, Virginia, on May 9, 2024. (Amanda Andrade-Rhoades for The Washington Post via Getty Images)
From the Experts February 4, 2025

New Report Examines Electricity Contracts for Data Centers and other Mega-load or Large-load Facilities

How electricity tariffs can protect households and small businesses from data centers and crypto mines’ enormous energy demands

In the News: FingerLakes1 January 30, 2025

Greenidge files appeal to stall DEC legal proceedings

Mandy DeRoche, Deputy Managing Attorney, Clean Energy Program: “This most recent emergency request to the Appellate Division is yet another effort by Greenidge to boost its own profits while it harms the Finger Lakes residents we represent, the local environment, and the climate. Justice delayed is justice denied, and we will keep fighting until the…

In the News: The Cool Down January 19, 2025

New data reveals staggering amount of electricity used by booming industry

Mandy DeRoche, Attorney, Clean Energy Program: “We are encouraged by the EIA’s actions to collect information on this hugely energy-intensive industry, which has grown so substantially in the United States in just the past couple of years and for which there is so little publicly-available information.”

In the News: Finger Lakes Daily News January 10, 2025

Earthjustice Files Brief Opposing Greenidge’s Emergency Request

Mandy DeRoche, Deputy Managing Attorney, Clean Energy Program, Earthjustice: “Greenidge’s request for a stay is meritless on its face. It’s ridiculous that Greenidge claims it can’t afford basic legal expenses in a proceeding that the publicly-traded company itself commenced.”

Data centers being built in Leesburg, Virginia, next to the Potomac Energy Center, a gas power plant. (Gerville / Getty Images)
From the Experts December 20, 2024

Managing the Growing Energy Demands of Datacenters and Crypto Mining

How states, utilities, and regulators can address digital energy demands to strengthen the grid.

The Greenidge Generation Bitcoin mining facility, along Seneca Lake in Dresden, NY, on Jul. 30, 2022. (Lauren Petracca for Earthjustice)
Press Release December 19, 2024

Cryptominer Greenidge Tries to Gift Finger Lakes Community with Years of More Litigation

Cryptominer Greenidge Generation files emergency request to delay legal proceedings within the DEC; if granted, the Finger Lakes community would be forced to endure harms of cryptomining while Greenidge stalls court proceedings without a valid air permit

The Greenidge Generating Station on the west shore of Seneca Lake, near Dresden, New York.
(Lauren Petracca for Earthjustice)
Press Release November 19, 2024

Local Advocates, Earthjustice, AM Kelles Celebrate Court Rulings Directing NY State Agencies to Uphold Climate Law

Two new court decisions uphold New York’s power to enforce and implement its Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (CLCPA) in regulating fossil-fuel generation

Press Release: Victory November 14, 2024

New York Court Rescinds Approval of Fracked Gas Power Plant Sale to Cryptocurrency Mining Company in North Tonawanda

Court finds that the NYS-PSC’s approval of the sale of the Digihost/Fortistar power plant did not comply with New York’s Climate Law; The PSC now required to analyze the transaction under the CLCPA

document November 14, 2024

Decision: NYS-DEC Fortistar

The Supreme Court of Albany County annulled NYS-Public Service Commission’s purchase approval of Fortistar North Tonawanda, a 55-megawatt fracked gas power plant solely utilized to mine crypto currency, and ordered the agency to reopen the question of whether the plant can be sold and to follow the law this time.

The Greenidge Generation Bitcoin mining facility, along Seneca Lake in Dresden, NY, on Jul. 30, 2022. (Lauren Petracca for Earthjustice)
Press Release: Victory November 14, 2024

New York Supreme Court Upholds DEC’s Authority to Enforce Climate Law; Sends Cryptominer Greenidge Generation Back for Final Permit Review

The climate-killing cryptominer Greenidge Generation failed its attempt to challenge DEC authority under the CLCPA but will have an opportunity to gather more evidence to support its permit renewal application back in administrative court