Gryphon Digital Mining has raised $14 million to establish renewable energy-driven bitcoin mining operations in the United States.
Established in late summer of last year, Gryphon raised the undisclosed round to fund a 100% renewables mining venture. The company is coming out of stealth at a time when public scrutiny of bitcoin mining and its perceived rampant energy appetite is burning hotter than ever.
“Some other companies in the industry right now use renewables, but no other company is committed to 100% renewable energy. We’re excited about that, especially considering the backlash the industry has received lately,” Gryphon Chair Brittany Kaiser said to CoinDesk.
“We have committed to not using [fossil fuels] going forward, so anything we use will be either hydro, nuclear, solar or wind. I believe we’re the first bitcoin mining company [to do so],” echoed CEO and co-founder Rob Chang.
The team would not reveal where it will host the machines, though a press release says the machines can “access electricity costs as low as $0.013/kWh.”
Gryphon’s first fleet of miners, roughly 730 petahashes worth, is already set up and will launch in the coming months. The team hopes to scale this to at least two or as many as five exahashes by 2022 as they import new ASIC shipments, the team told CoinDesk.
The venture has plans to go public, but at an unspecified date, the team told CoinDesk.
The US bitcoin mining gold rush
Bitcoin’s price is up in light of Coinbase’s public listing tomorrow, an event that, perhaps better than any, edifies bitcoin’s increasingly accepted status in mainstream investor circles.
The same institutional attention has focused on bitcoin mining, as both old and new ventures in the United States ramp up operations to cash in on bitcoin’s bull run. Many continue to raise money to finance bulk purchases of ASICs or expand to new data centers.
Chang said Gryphon’s renewables-only model “was a good selling point,” adding that the energy question is an “item that is increasingly more important in the minds of investors.” Indeed, "Shark Tank's" Kevin O’Leary has swung his investor’s ax in bitcoin mining and told CoinDesk recently this topic was a concern to him and others in his circle.
“For some it was a nice onus, and for others it was the entire reason they wanted to invest in miners. It was a good mix,” Chang told CoinDesk.
Whether they are investing in renewables mining of flared/vented gas mining, U.S. investors are rushing for their stake in 2021’s digital gold rush. Kaiser doesn’t anticipate the trend will slow any time soon, as pressure from the Chinese government’s new digital currency and U.S. interest in the sector continue to drive hashrate to America.
“I think we have seen a perfect storm in the market. We have strong interest from institutional investors from [North America]. But China is releasing the digital yuan, and you can see pressure on miners to not create competitive coins. There is a huge opportunity, especially before the U.S. dollar is released, for Bitcoin and other networks to gain traction and have exponential mining growth in the U.S.”