"Existential Threat" to Bitmain/Allrise bitcoin facility passes Senate committee review, heads to floor vote

Last Friday, the State Senate ​Committee on Environment, Energy & Technology cleared House Bill 1416 for a floor vote and recommended 5-2 that the Senate vote to pass the bill. HB1416 closes a loophole in the Clean Energy Transformation Act that enables Bitmain/Allirse to purchase electricity from high-pollution sources for their Bitcoin mining operations in Pend Oreille County. Bitmain/Allrise local crypto executives have publicly described the bill as an "existential threat" to their future business operations because it will force them to purchase clean energy at a slightly higher cost (a fraction of a cent per kilowatt hour).  But at a time when it already paying between $15,000 and $23,000 in electricity for each Bitcoin they are able to win (depending on the variable price of electricity), that small margin will have an oversize impact on their already sagging bottom line. For more one Bitmain/Allrise's struggling financials, read here: POC Cryptonomics - PROTECT PEND OREILLE

In contrast to Beijing Bitmain's and their partner Allrise Capital's plight, HB1416 will economically benefit the other 9,600 customers of our citizen-owned PUD. Every other industrial, commercial, and residential customer in Pend Oreille County already uses CETA-compliant electricity. Only Bitmain/Allrise do not.  HB1416 will help ensure that our PUD can deliver low electricity rates to its current and future customers. It will also incentivize small- and medium-sized businesses to locate to the county to take advantage of low-cost, clean energy provided by our PUD. Our PUD can easily support many more Vaagen Lumber-sized business in our County with its current power allocation from Boundary Dam. Read more here: HB1416 - PROTECT PEND OREILLE

Bitmain/Allrise, assisted by County Commissioner John Gentle, lobbied State legislators to not pass the bill or to add a "Cascade Amendment" (likely are reference to Cascade Digital Mining) that would have compelled the residents and businesses of Pend Oreille County to subsidize Bijing's bitcoin mining in the county-- which would have cost residents millions of dollars each year.  Read more here: Zenk Letter - PROTECT PEND OREILLE

Several residents of Pend Oreille County gave testimony asking members of the Committee to pass HB1416 as is and not to support Bitmain/Allrise's proposed Bitcoin amendment. One of witnesses was Newport resident Gloria Jean Wells. Ms. Wells moved to Pend Oreille County after working as a state civil servant for 32 years. She began her career at the Washington State University College of Pharmacy and concluded as a Support Enforcment Officer. She and her husband love Pend Oreille County for its rural living, clean rivers and lakes, open space, and abundant wildlife. Here is her testimony: 

Good morning and thank you for the opportunity to speak to you about why I support HB 1416.
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Paper mills have been rapidly closing across the nation. Good example is the former papermill in Pend Oreille Co. The current owners are foreign investors-Allrise/Bitmain, which is Incorporated in Cayman Islands (resource is Wash. St DOR tax information).

Please vote yes on HB 1416 because it will protect Pend Oreille County residents from subsidizing Allrise/Bitmain, which is a bitcoin foreign currency corporation; protect wildlife, farm animals, environment, energy, etc. 

Allrise/Bitmain should be required to develop better ways to bring more environmentally friendly energy, not use Pend Oreille County limited natural resources.  As you know, Bitcoin consumes excessive electricity per transaction, doesn't benefit residents of Pend Oreille County or Washington State, doesn't create jobs, is a high-risk business, it's not regulated, we have heard that people have lost their entire life savings by deposits disappearing, etc.

I thank you for having this public hearing, please vote “yes” on HB 1416.

March 29 is National Vietnam War Veterans Day. Thank You to those who served. 

The Vietnam War Veterans Recognition Act of 2017 officially designated March 29 as National Vietnam War Veterans Day. 

According to the American Legion: "This is a time to pay special tribute to the 9 million Americans who served during the Vietnam War era, to the 58,000 names memorialized on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., and to those who never received the recognition they deserved when they returned to America from war. March 29, 1973 is the day U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam was disestablished and the day the last U.S. combat troops departed Vietnam. In addition, on and around this same day, the U.S. Vietnam War Commemoration stated that Hanoi released the last of its acknowledged prisoners of war."

Our County is the proud home of approximately 1,400 Veterans. Half of these Veterans served during the Vietnam War.  Approximately one third of the Veterans in our County bear the life-long burden of a disabling medical condition due to their service to Our Nation.

We at Protect Pend Oreille want to thank those who served during the Vietnam War for protecting us.  Your Service made a difference. 

The passage of time brings new perspectives of our past. Modern historians of the Cold War now remind us that the Vietnam War played a vital role in the generational conflict between freedom and oppression that we call the Cold War. Your courage and fortitude marked a line around the globe behind which more than half of the peoples of the world living on the western side of the Iron Curtain could prosper in peace and ever-increasing freedom. The peoples of East Asia, Europe, and the United States of America owe you a debt of gratitude for the lives we live today. 

Thank You.