ASHEVILLE – As nearby small towns battle the cryptocurrency mines that have moved into their communities, Buncombe County is considering a temporary moratorium on mining operations, a full-stop for one year to consider regulations or potentially prohibit the mines altogether.
At its April 4 meeting, Buncombe County Board of Commissioners set a public hearing for May 2 to consider the ordinance imposing the moratorium. If approved, staff recommends it last from May 2, 2023, to May 1, 2024.
“Based on my time on the commission, we have not had anything like this come in front of us before,” said Commissioner Terri Wells, who initially brought the conversation to the board after hearing community concern.
“We felt like we wanted to make sure that with the (Comprehensive Plan) coming, we have the ability to assess everything going forward. With the moratorium, it definitely gives us a chance to make sure that we’re getting ahead of it, and looking at the big picture.”
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Large cryptocurrency mining operations, which are basically large warehouses full of computers, are currently not specified as a land use within the county’s zoning ordinances.
Planning Director Nate Pennington said the county currently has no applications for such projects, but a moratorium would give the county “more time” to figure out what kind of standards or other regulations should be in place.
Crypto mining operations have the potential to “negatively impact surrounding neighborhoods due to excessive energy use, e-waste, pollution and noise,” said Pennington’s report to the board, and a temporary pause will “protect public interest and welfare of the residents of the county until such regulations … are adopted.”
Wells also noted that cryptocurrency mines don’t typically create significant economic job impacts or opportunities.
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What is cryptocurrency mining?
Mining for cryptocurrency involves banks of specialized computers completing billions of computations every second in a bid to win a sort of lottery against other miners. The winner verifies a block of transactions that are added to the blockchain, the virtual ledgers underpinning cryptocurrencies, and for their work, miners receive a bundle of coins that can be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.
In North Carolina, the conversation around crypto mining began broadly in the town of Murphy in Cherokee County, about 90 miles southwest of Asheville, wedged between Tennessee and Georgia in the state’s westernmost corner.
When residents brought their concerns to her, said Wells, Murphy almost always came up.
According to December 2021 reporting from USA TODAY, Cherokee saw its first cryptocurrency mine open in 2019 within an old thread factory. A few months later, another crypto mine came to the area, and then another, with at least three mines opening in the county since 2020.
In Murphy, noise created from some of the crypto mines has begun to terrorize community members, described in some reporting as an “otherworldly pitch,” and in an August story from The Washington Post, as “a jet-like roar” that never ends.
The minutes from a Jan. 23 Cherokee County Board of Commissioners meeting make mention of an introduction of a noise ordinance as an attempt to address the “crypto-mining issue.” The county attorney said the county had previously adopted and submitted a resolution to the General Assembly, requesting a state law that would ban crypto-mines in Cherokee County.
Crypto mining demand — and how design standards, zoning regulations and municipal practices should change to meet it — is relatively new to much of United States, Pennington said, but he saw other localities taking an interest as well, such as Missoula, Montana, and Pitt County, N.C.
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What comes next for Buncombe County?
A Buncombe County staff report says the county looked at alternative solutions to the moratorium but found none. The zoning ordinance does not outright define cryptocurrency mining as a specific use, according to a February staff presentation, but there is a generic classification of storage and warehousing.
The staff report says that a one year moratorium, if approved, will allow the county to complete its comprehensive plan and study what types of zoning districts are appropriate for this land use.
County staff is directed to study and prepare an amendment to the zoning ordinance regarding cryptocurrency mining prior to the expiration of the moratorium.
Sarah Honosky is the city government reporter for the Asheville Citizen Times, part of the USA TODAY Network. News Tips? Email [email protected] or message on Twitter at @slhonosky. Please support local, daily journalism with a subscription to the Citizen Times.
