Residents near the rural North Texas town of Granbury claim that noise from a Bitcoin mining facility is making them sick, and they want it to stop.
Marathon Digital Holdings owns the mine, which began operating in 2022 next to Constellation Energy’s Wolf Hollow II power plant just outside Granbury in Hood County.
County officials lost a noise pollution case last week against the facility’s manager, yet they plan to continue fighting the noxious noise emitted by Marathon’s mining operation—one of 10 in Texas that not only pose a health hazard but are also drawing massive amounts of energy from the state’s already-strained electric grid.
Fans used to cool the facility’s thousands of data-processing computers emit a constant buzz.
TIME Magazine recently reported on health issues suffered by Hood County residents that they attribute to noise pollution produced by the fans: sleep loss, migraines, nausea, vertigo, hearing loss, chest pains, hypertension, and more.
Locals say their animals are also distressed by the sound.
“We’re living in a nightmare,” a resident told TIME.
Responding to constituents’ complaints, Hood County Precinct 2 Constable John Shirley began to measure the noise levels and determined they violated the state’s disorderly conduct statute.
Texas law defines noise as “unreasonable” if “the decibel level exceeds 85 after the person making the noise receives notice from a magistrate or peace officer that the noise is a public nuisance.”
Each violation is a Class C misdemeanor punishable by a $500 fine.
Shirley issued more than 30 noise citations over several months to the Marathon plant manager, David Fischer, and the corporation.
Following a two-day trial last week in a county justice of the peace court, a jury found Fischer not guilty on a dozen cited noise violations.
According to a report by Hood County News, jurors agreed the plant’s noise levels were “unreasonable” but did not agree the plant manager was personally responsible.
“We lost the first inning, but we’re going to keep working with lawmakers,” Hood County Commissioner Nannette Samuelson told Texas Scorecard.
Shirley described the trial as “David versus Goliath.”
Both Shirley and Hood County Attorney Matt Mills worked within the existing laws, resulting in what was described as a “ground-breaking” case, despite facing Marathon’s team of corporate lawyers.
“The trial was disappointing but no surprise, as we expected a multi-round fight,” Shirley acknowledged in an interview with Texas Scorecard.
He explained that the statutory definition of “unreasonable” noise is part of the problem and needs to be addressed by state lawmakers.
Shirley found research showing that chronic exposure to low-frequency noise can cause significant health problems and that the common method of measuring sound on the decibel scale significantly underestimates levels of harmful low-frequency noise.
“This is a complex case that is setting precedent. We need to do the right thing for individual constituents and for businesses,” he said.
“I support Texas embracing Bitcoin,” Shirley added. “I don’t support corporations being irresponsible.”
In addition to the noxious noise produced by the bitcoin mines, Texans worry about the stress the mining operations put on the state’s electric grid.
Gov. Greg Abbott has spent the past few years seeking to make the state “number one” in cryptocurrency mining.
Marathon’s Hood County facility is one of 10 bitcoin mines in Texas, which consume a combined 2,000-3,000 megawatts of electricity a day—about 2.5 percent of the state’s peak load.
Marathon buys electricity for the mine directly from Constellation under a power purchase agreement, at a fraction of the cost residential users pay.
The Florida-based company also operates two larger crypto-mining facilities in Texas, in McCamey and Garden City.
A facility in Rockdale owned by Riot Platforms is the largest and most energy-intensive Bitcoin mine in the country, using as much electricity as 300,000 homes.
During legislative hearings in June, ERCOT CEO Pablo Vegas estimated that statewide electricity demand will grow from 85,000 to 150,000 megawatts by 2030.
According to Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, over half of the increased demand will come from crypto-mining and AI data centers.
“Texans will ultimately pay the price,” Patrick posted on X after the hearing. “We want data centers, but it can’t be the Wild Wild West of data centers and crypto miners crashing our grid and turning the lights off.”
Grid concerns may slow Abbott’s efforts to attract new bitcoin businesses, but Texans who live near mines in Hood County and elsewhere must still deal with health problems caused by noise from existing facilities.
Shirley said Marathon mentioned several mitigation efforts, including replacing the noisy fans with quieter liquid immersion cooling systems.
The constable said he will continue monitoring noise levels while county officials consider their next steps for protecting residents.
“This is not going to be solved in a week or a year,” Shirley added. “As long as my constituents are being harmed, I’m going to act within the law.”
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