North Tonawanda Residents Say NO to Fossil-Fueled Crypto Mining!

NORTH TONAWANDA, NY (06/20/2024) (readMedia)-- This morning, advocates and North Tonawanda residents will hold a press conference to urge the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) to deny the air permit renewal for Digihost/Fortistar North Tonawanda, the polluting proof-of-work crypto mining operation in Western New York. The group will also urge the North Tonawanda City Council to approve a two-year moratorium on crypto mining.

Digihost/Fortistar North Tonawanda was previously a peaker plant that occasionally provided energy to the grid, about 3-5 weeks a year. But, with their change in operations to mine cryptocurrency in early 2023, the facility is steadily increasing their emissions by combusting fracked gas 24/7/365 to mine Bitcoin. In just the first few months of 2024, the Facility emitted nearly the same amount of emissions as it did in all of 2022 and 2023 combined! This drastic increase in operations is making the facility a major source of local air pollution and climate change-accelerating greenhouse gas emissions - while the rest of the state focuses on reducing greenhouse gas emissions in order to meet the mandates of NYS's climate law. When it is operating, the facility is also a constant source of health-harming noise pollution for the people who live near the plant, as described in Sunday's Buffalo News story.

Digihost/Fortistar North Tonawanda applied for a renewal of its air permit three years ago. Advocates are demanding the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation follow the precedent it set by denying crypto-miner Greenidge Generation's air permit two years ago in June 2022, which has been upheld twice, in 2023 and 2024.

This presser will be livestreamed here.