At the annual Bitcoin conference on Saturday in Nashville, former President Donald Trump began to lay out his “plan to ensure the United States will be the crypto capital of the planet and the Bitcoin superpower of the world.”
Speaking in front of a large crowd, President Trump said, “Bitcoin is not just a marvel of technology, as you know, it’s a miracle of cooperation and human achievement.” He made the case that America needs to lead on Bitcoin and the crypto industry globally.
According to several reports, many states, including Texas, are competing to lead the way and attract major investments in the emerging crypto and blockchain industry in their states.
An analysis conducted of all 50 states found that Texas was among the top 15 prospective states for crypto and blockchain investments. The analysis, conducted by Commodity.com, took into account Texas’ no income tax, low electricity prices, and cost of living among other factors.
In the past, Governor Greg Abbott has signaled his support for the industry. In 2015, Abbott began accepting campaign contributions in Bitcoin. Then, in 2021, Abbott posted on X (Twitter at the time) that “Texas will be a crypto leader.”
Texas Senator Ted Cruz said, “what makes Texas different than the rest of the world is that Texans love freedom, and so do digital asset bulls.” Later in the interview on Fox News Radio, Cruz went on to say that Texas was “an oasis for Bitcoin mining.”
But, in June, Lt. Governor Dan Patrick took a stance at odds with the others. In response to a report from ERCOT on increased projections for the power grid, Patrick said, “crypto miners and data centers will be responsible for over 50% of the added growth” to the energy grid and that “Texans will ultimately pay the price.” He continued, “I’m more interested in building the grid to service customers in their homes, apartments, and normal businesses and keeping costs low.”
Lee Bratcher, President and founder of the Texas Blockchain Council (TBC), doesn’t think it is a zero-sum game. In an episode of the Texas Talks podcast, Bratcher pointed out that miners only account for 2-4% of the total energy load currently, and miners, unlike other large energy users, have a flexible load, meaning mines turn off when power usage is high and they turn on when power usage is low. Bratcher believes this helps with overall grid reliability, which is a major goal of TBC and the Lt. Governor.
A study conducted by Texas A&M University found that crypto mining, “if well-coordinated, could be tailor-designed to aggressively absorb the increasing uncertainties of energy supply, and, in turn, provide valuable grid-level services in the electricity market. The study concluded, which Bratcher argued they already do, that crypto miners could seek out latent energy that would otherwise go untapped and improve grid reliability.
