Utah has rolled out the red carpet for one of America’s most exploitative industries.
In the decline time of the legal session, Utah gave free governance to the unregulated, environmentally destructive crypto industry, along with the passage of amendments to HB230, blockchain and digital innovation. The newly passed law encloses what is called “correct,” implements crypto, independent digital assets, blockchain nodes, and bets tokens with minimal interference or surveillance.
Don’t make mistakes – this is not an innovation. It hurts all Yutans who pays the electricity bill and cares about clean air and water, or believe that public funds should serve the public interest.
The bill was written to provide crypto industry coverage from local zoning laws, noise ordinances, public scrutiny and surveillance of all kinds. This allows the industry to pollute our air, suck our water, and feast on fee payer-funded electricity without local reliance.
The bill also waives these digital operations requirements to obtain the required remittance licenses for other companies engaged in electronic transfers. These licenses typically require a review of the financial audit from the applicant company. It gives the so-called “miners” – the companies behind the power-hungry warehouses of computers that solve fake mathematics problems in exchange for digital coins are “right” to make assets while the rest of us pay the price. And we pay the price we do.
The kind of proof of work that this bill will take effect already consumes an estimated 2.3% of the total US power supply. That’s more than the country uses, and for Utah, it means higher power rates for families and small businesses, higher grid burdens, higher fossil fuel emissions, and increased pollution.
In effect, HB230 creates a state-sanctioned “opportunity zone” for encryption, encouraging access to public resources while also protecting it from the fundamental accountability faced by other industries. Importantly, the bill does not include provisions to control water usage. This is an obvious omission when all drops are prone to significant droughts.
In Utah, where drought conditions are expected to worsen in the coming years due to climate change, excessive water consumption in encryption is insulting injuries. These facilities can use 300,000 households of water per year to prevent the machines from overheating. It’s not progress. It is the abuse of essential and rare shared public resources.
And there’s noise. If you’ve never lived near encryption, imagine a semi-truck engine running outside your window 24/7. And under this law, local governments cannot stop them – whether residents have lost their sleep or are being kicked out of their homes by unstoppable hams.
The crypto industry wants them to believe they are leading the way in the future. But the truth is, they are dragging us behind us – more pollution, more waste, more corporate greed. Most Americans don’t use cryptography, and many don’t understand it. But our electricity bill, our water, and our zoning laws are being taken away to support it.
If lawmakers were bothering them looking around, they would see other states already learning this lesson the hard way. Arkansas passed roughly the same bill last year. Chaos continued. Noise complaints flooded. Utility costs have skyrocketed. Lawmakers were forced to walk it, and even co-sponsors admitted they were misunderstood.
Utah doesn’t have to expect the same thing. Lawmakers and the crypto industry are celebrating the passage of the bill as a bipartisan victory that the state will position itself as a leader. But it’s a corporate giveaway, simple and simple. The crypto industry does not require any special protection. Actual surveillance is required, especially in states like ours, where valuable natural resources and strong local governance are essential to our quality of life.
The crypto industry is massive and highly resourceful, but we are fighting back. The National Union of Cryptocurrency has already worked in 18 states to stop this wave of deregulation. We are building a bipartisan movement of rural and urban, Republican and Democrat everyday people who are tired of seeing businesses improve the quality of our lives while our leaders cheer them on.
Elected officials need to choose who to serve in the fantasy of finance and the deep pocket lobby behind it. We won’t stop fighting until public funds, natural resources and communities are no longer sold.
