Senator Joshua Bryant of Rogers was the primary sponsor of House Bill 1799and said that the burgeoning cryptocurrency industry is no different than other types of businesses.
"You have to look at it, you have to look at it," Bryant said. "But at the end of the day, it may be a part of our society that really moves us forward."
Senator Bryant said his priority during this legislative session was defending property rights. And for him, this bill was part of that, too.
"No one but local citizens (in fact, veterans, of which I am) came up to me and said, 'Hey, I want to invest.' I want to bring millions of dollars to our state of Arkansas. But I want some protections that, as long as I follow and follow the rules, I won't be arbitrarily kicked out of the state,'โ he said.
To put it mildly, a lot of attention was paid to some important laws that were passed this year. House Bill 1799 was not one of those.
On Thursday, March 30, the bill was introduced and assigned to the House Information Technology and Advanced Communications Committee. On Monday, April 3, he left the committee unanimously. On Tuesday, April 4, the House voted 88-2 to send it to the Senate. On Wednesday, April 5, the Senate City, County and Local Affairs committee heard the amended version of the bill and passed it unanimously. On Thursday, April 6, the Senate approved it unanimously. and for friday, On April 7, the amended version of the bill passed the House 93-1.
Senator Bryant said he was surprised by the rejection of Law 851considering it happened so easily.
"I introduced some pretty controversial legislation - just for discussion, at least for something else - and I was a little surprised that this took a lot of energy away from the others [bills instead]. It should not be controversial from a property rights point of view. "The reason the legislation is good is because, regardless of whether this legislation was intact or not, crypto mining was already in Arkansas and crypto companies were already looking at Arkansas," he said.
There appear to be three main concerns with the bitcoin mining facilities springing up in Arkansas. The first is a pressure on public services, such as water.
Terry Don Robinson is the mayor of Wooster, Arkansas. There is a cryptocurrency mine in Greenbrier, but it gets its water from neighboring Wooster. Robinson said whoever installed the water cooling system probably did it incorrectly and that a major water leak has been a problem for months. He said the facility uses two different 2,000-gallon tanks that are designed to recirculate and use the same amount of water consistently for 60 days. After those 60 days, they throw away the water, which is in no way contaminated, and refill those tanks. But due to the leak, the usage was extremely high. One month's reading was 479,000 gallons of water, another month it was 601,000 gallons of water. Robinson points out that the months with the most water leakage are not indicative of its regular use.
Electricity, on the other hand, is a bigger concern. A study by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy As of September 2022, total global electricity use for cryptocurrency mining assets is estimated to be between 120 billion and 240 billion kilowatt-hours per year. That's more than countries like Australia and Argentina.
But the bill establishes language that says these facilities "shall operate in a manner that does not cause stress on the generating capabilities or transmission network of an electric utility." Senator Bryant said this means cryptocurrencies had to negotiate with the Arkansas Public Utilities Commission.
"We don't want them to consume and take consumption away from other consumers or from our hospitals or retail businesses, and cryptocurrencies did that," Senator Bryant said. In exchange for agreeing to allow their electricity to be shut off to prioritize other critical services, Entergy Arkansas has offered crypto mining facilities a discounted rate for electricity.
The second big concern is the noise produced by cryptocurrencies. Like us reported in August, these facilities can be very noisy. Robinson, Wooster's mayor, said a sound barrier wall has been installed.
โI think they will have to install another one to the south,โ he said. โThey put one in the north and it has a curved top, so instead of sending the sound north, it now sends it south. It's quite noisy, it would be annoying if you lived there seven days a week. And youโve probably reduced the value of your property to zero, thatโs the main thing.โ
Senator Bryant said that being able to have peace and quiet on your property is a right that people should be able to enjoy, and that Law 851 states that all of these facilities will follow local regulations.
It is true that many local municipalities have noise or decibel level ordinances. However, that is not always the case in rural communities or at the county level. And Law 851 establishes that a local government will not impose a different requirement for a digital asset mining business than that applicable to any requirement for a data center. That means that if a cryptocurrency mine is set up in a rural area and there is no noise ordinance beforehand, the local government cannot enact a new ordinance.
The latest concern revolves around ownership of the mines. Reports from several other media outlets have pointed out connections between crypto mining in Arkansas and China. In Ozarks in freedom, we don't have enough independent reporting to feel confident making those same claims. However, after Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders and Attorney General Tim Griffin recently held a press conference, announcing the elimination of a seed company that owned 160 acres of land in Craighead County because its parent company was an entity owned by the Chinese government, concerns are growing around the various LLCs involved in crypto mining. The law that was used in the Syngenta case, Law 636, prohibits 9 different countries from owning agricultural land, so it is not entirely clear if it would apply to this situation. Senator Bryant says he nevertheless contacted the Attorney General about this concern.
"They are reviewing it, investigating it, and will address it if it violates the law," Senator Bryant said.
Senator Bryant recalled a bill from a previous session in which a lawmaker prohibited the sale of any land to a foreign national. "That didn't move forward, because there are landowners in Arkansas who want to be able to sell their land for the best and biggest profits." He said someone described him as trying to get a stick out of a bunch of sticks. "Be careful which one you choose, because the package could fall apart."
Ozark in freedom He approached Governor Sanders' office to speak with Jamie Barker, the governor's legislative director. He was not available for an interview or comment. Communications Director Alexa Henning also declined a request for an on-the-record interview, but provided a statement saying the safety of Arkansans is Governor Sanders' top priority.
