The hash rate of Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency in the market, plummeted by more than 38% because of extreme weather conditions, where US-based Bitcoin miners shut down operations. According to data from PowerOutage.us, the US deadly winter storm, what meteorologists are calling a bomb cyclone, has stirred up blizzard-like conditions in some places and left many places in Maine and New York without power.
As of the 23rd of December, there were more than one million businesses and homes without power due to this deadly winter storm, according to a report from Yahoo News. This power outage has also affected several Bitcoin miners that have rushed to turn off their machines because of these weather and power conditions.
According to data from Glassnode, the hash rate of Bitcoin fell from 252.98 EH/s on the 21st of December to 156.36 EH/s on the 24th of December. This drop in the hash rate of Bitcoin is the biggest daily drop since the beginning of June. Hash rate means the measure of the total computational power used to mine and process transactions on a blockchain network. Whenever the hash rate becomes higher, the network becomes more decentralized and secure.
The extreme winter weather conditions, led by a bomb cyclone, stretched the South, the Rio Grande, and along the border with Mexico. On the 22nd of December, Riot Blockchain, a crypto mining company, announced that it closed down its Rockdale facility in Texas to ensure the safety of our team members.
Core Scientific, a major Bitcoin mining company, filed for bankruptcy on the 21st of December. Regarding the reason behind these bankruptcy filings, in a Twitter post, Core wrote that due to extreme cold weather sweeping across the eastern and southern half of the US, we would be participating in multiple power curtailments to help stabilize the electrical grid. BTC production is expected to decrease during this time, the mining firm added. This shows how extreme weather conditions or power outage affects cryptocurrency miners.
