The costs of crypto mining in Georgia. Will it be regulated along with new data center rules?

Caption

A CleanSpark crypto mining facility in Sandersville, Georgia has the power capacity of 250 megawatts.

Credit: CleanSpark

With great attention paid to Georgia data centers and their impacts on the environment and local communities, another type of major industrial facility is racking up lots of energy consumption — enough to put Georgia second in the country, according to one report.

Georgia is now home to more than a dozen crypto mining facilities, and while data centers have become a major focus for Georgia residents and politicians, crypto mines have used up significant amounts of energy with less scrutiny.

Some of the increased demand in Georgia is due to an international pushback on these crypto facilities, bringing more of them to the U.S.

In 2021, China banned cryptocurrency data centers, a few years after calling them “undesirable.” Many other countries, including Norway, Russia and Algeria have restrictions on crypto mining because they can destabilize the electric grid and high energy consumption, according to Purdue Law.

Amid these international bans, U.S. operations have risen dramatically. Though the exact amount of energy used by crypto mines in the U.S. isn’t clear and is changing, one report from The Miner Mag in December 2024 showed Texas leading the way with 3,847 megawatts and Georgia following in a distant second with 703 MW. New York was third in the report at 546 MW.

Crypto and Bitcoin expert, Alex de Vries, says the reported energy consumption is significantly less than what’s actually being used because these mines aren’t required to report usage to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

The largest crypto operator in Georgia, CleanSpark, says it has 14 mining operations using a reported 620 MW of energy as of Nov. 17. There are more, and Elijay resident Cyndie Roberson has taken it upon herself to track as many as possible, finding dozens that have been proposed or built.

“Why wouldn’t you want to come here (to Georgia),” Cyndie Roberson, an anti-crypto activist from Elijay, said during a data center summit in Atlanta last month. “We’re the most generous state for data centers, which includes crypto mines.”

Roberson is referring to a 2018 tax subsidy law that allowed equipment inside of data centers to be purchased without any sales tax. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution found this amount accounts for nearly $300 million in taxes not collected by the state or local government, creating a wave of incentives for these data centers to set up shop in Georgia.

Clean Spark told the Ledger-Enquirer via email that Georgia is a “business-friendly state.”

“Georgia provides us with the flexibility to diversify further into AI and HPC infrastructure, while leveraging our existing power agreements and the state’s grid stability,” Eleni Stylianou, director of communications and marketing, said. “It is also a business-friendly state, and both local officials and community members have welcomed us warmly because our presence brings meaningful economic development to their towns.”

Crypto mining amounts to a massive guessing game of validating blockchain transactions, which creates a crypto coin or token. Created remotely from a personal computer, significant computing power is needed for the transactions for currencies such as Bitcoin, the dominant cryptocurrency. This mining is done in remote areas, inside what looks like a cargo container box. These are often called an antminer box, but mining is also done inside larger facilities akin to a hyperscale server farm or data center.

Caption

Inside the 20 megawatt CleanSpark crytpo mining center in Norcross.

Credit: Courtesy of The Ledger-Enquirer

Emissions and noise pollution

Roberson, a retired nurse who helped get crypto mining banned in Gilmer County, calls herself an “unexpected activist” and has become a crypto expert. She is the National Coalition Against Cryptomining’s Southeastern Alliance representative.

“When you put hundreds of computers in these antminer boxes, you cool it with big air cooling fans,” she told the L-E. “Every ASIC miner has a fan that produces 50 to 75 decibels. So when you get thousands of fans, that is when you get these ungodly decibel levels permeating through a local community.”

Just like data centers used by tech giants, crypto takes energy. But it uses far less water for cooling, as fans are substantial enough for the crypto equipment. The only water used is in the process to make the energy to power the centers, such as using water to cool down a coal or natural gas plant during its operations, for example.

“On-site (cryptomines) are not using water because they are torturing everybody with sound pollution; however, the 300 or 400 megawatts of energy they might be using uses so much water,” Roberson said.

Alex De Vries has been researching energy consumption of digital assets since 2016 and has turned his Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index into a doctorate.

“It gets quite complex on a carbon emission and water calculation,” De Vries told the L-E.

Crypto centers are not required to report emissions, though an attempt was made in January 2024 by the Energy Information Administration. But the scope was limited to “identified commercial cryptocurrency miners.”

The SEC has clarified that mining itself does not require SEC registration.

In 2023, Texas created a rule requiring mining facilities that need 75 megawatts or more to register with the state’s grid operator. But there are no registration requirements in Georgia.

Stylianou said CleanSpark would like to use renewable energy sources if it could, but the company relies on whatever is within the Georgia grid.

“CleanSpark draws its power directly from Georgia’s grid and due to its broader energy mix, using renewable energy isn’t always possible, although it’s preferred,” she said. “As an energy off-taker, we don’t have input into what types of electrical generation is built or supplied by our utility partners.”

She added the company prefers an “all of the above approach that supports environmental protection, grid reliability, and affordable electricity for residential and commercial customers.”

“Everybody can’t be using 100% of Plant Vogtle, it’s just not possible,” Roberson said, suggesting the nation’s newest nuclear power plant, which produces energy carbon-free, can’t supply everything.

De Vries says crypto will rely on fossil fuels unless more renewable energy is produced.

“These miners never rely on renewable energy because they plug into the power grid and run 24/7,” De Vries said. “If you have a data center or crypto miner coming in and demanding a lot of power, the extra power demand is not going to be provided by renewable energy because those are already in use as much as possible. They will get the power from backup sources, which are fossil fuel-based.”

A New York Times investigation in 2023 found that one CleanSpark-run crypto mining operation in Sandersville used energy equivalent to that of 49,000 households.

Further northwest, in Dalton, the Times found that crypto company Core Scientific is using as much power as Madison Square Garden 28 times over. Roberson calls the city the “crypto capital of Georgia.”

All crypto mines accounted for by the L-E are powered by MEAG or EMC facilities, which vary in their carbon-free energy output.

CleanSpark’s power rate agreement allows the company to pay significantly less than many Georgia electric customers — as little as 4 to 6 cents per kilowatt hour, according to an August 2025 Investor presentation. Customers with Georgia Power and other major power providers in the state pay, on average, 15.4 cents per kw/h, and the national average across the U.S. is 17.62, the Energy Information Administration’s August 2025 report states.

“Where is the logic or equity?” Roberson asked.

Gilmer County is the only Georgia county to have a ban on crypto, which came after Roberson’s organizing efforts last year. The city of Hiawasee prohibits crypto as well. Several other counties have restrictions on the noise and size of crypto facilities, such as Union, Bulloch, Monroe and Pierce counties. The city of Elijay also has restrictions, and the city of Adel has a moratorium on these mines in place that has been extended several times since 2023.

Caption

Fans blow on the outside of the Sandersville crypto mine operation, owned by CleanSpark.

Credit: CleanSpark

Will crypto be regulated by these 4 Georgia counties?

This month, four counties are set to finalize ordinances that restrict data centers: Coweta, DeKalb, Troup and Pike counties. Several counties and cities have placed restrictions on data centers to mitigate energy usage and disturbance to the local community, and Atlanta has banned them.

In the four counties set to consider similar changes, moratoriums that paused data center development are coming to an end. Activists hope local officials will consider adding crypto mines to their new legislation, restricting those facilities too in one sweep. Roberson hopes these counties will follow Gilmer County’s example.

“It just has to be a simple, one-line statement, ‘prohibit crypto mining,’” Roberson shared with data center summit goers last month. “Gilmer County is the model ordinance.”

Coweta County’s moratorium on data centers originally expired Nov. 3, but county officials extended it to Dec. 4. That moratorium is set to have another two weeks until it expires on Dec. 16. The latest draft language for an ordinance on data centers does not include crypto mining, but does impose noise limits on data centers, and prohibits open-loop cooling.

DeKalb County extended its data center moratorium from Oct. 16 to Dec. 16. Tensions were high at recent commissioner meetings as debates carried on about data centers. The commission’s latest draft of an ordinance does not explicitly say whether crypto mining would be banned. There is a town hall to discuss DeKalb County’s data center ordinance on Dec. 10.

Troup County’s data center moratorium was due to end Dec. 15, but on the county Board of Commissioners extended it in a Tuesday meeting. It will last another 90 days, aligning with the LaGrange moratorium expiration date in March.

“Please please extend the moratorium, there is still work to be done,” Cyndie Hutchings, a data center activist from LaGrange told the commissioners during the meeting.

‘Overreach,’ big money brought in from these facilities

Pike County will hear its second reading regarding an ordinance on Dec. 10, according to the county manager and county attorney, Rob Morton.

Morton told the Ledger-Enquirer there is no outright ban on crypto because “it is an overreach.”

“You run into problems when you do an outright ban on land uses,” he said. “There are many counties that have data centers that are beneficial.”

CleanSpark contributed $16 million in city taxes and $13 million in city margins across Georgia, according to Stylianou.

This story comes to GPB through a reporting partnership with Columbus Ledger-Enquirer.