FAYETTEVILLE – A cryptocurrency data mining company plans to open a facility in Fayetteville, the company and economic development officials announced this morning.
Plan C Crypto, expects to open the facility in the third quarter of 2022 and employ 19 people initially. It also has facilities coming online in Tarboro, Boone, and Wilson, the company’s co-founder and CEO Antonio Bestard told WRAL TechWire in an interview.
The announcement comes on the heels of the news that Amazon will build a second facility in Cumberland County.
“It’s really exciting for us,” said Maarja Hightower, a spokespserson for the Fayetteville Cumberland Economic Development Corporation (FCEDC), in an interview with WRAL TechWire. The precise location of the facility has not yet been announced, and Hightower declined to comment on the facility’s location, though the statement indicates the company will locate in an existing industrial-zoned facility.
The site will become what the company calls a regional headquarters facility and will be the fourth in the state, according to a statement shared with WRAL TechWire by FCEDC. It could open as soon as August, Bestard noted.
The company builds “immersion-based mining facilities,” which Bestard noted can operate in a surprisingly small footprint, with no additional noise concerns. He sayd that highlights a difference between this infrastructure and air-cooled mining operations and similar data centers. Bestard added that the company is structured to “green” the power grid.
Immersion mining is defined as “the process of fully submerging mining machines into liquid for cooling. Compared to traditional air-cooling, immersion mining improves machine performance and efficiency,” according to EliteMining.
The website adds that the technique reduces power consumption – a key concern about cryptomining. “Simply removing fans can reduce power consumption by 15-20%. By eliminating the need for robust air conditioning units or rooms, you can reduce power consumption by 40-50%,” EliteMining says.
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High wage jobs
According to the statement, the firm will look to hire “skilled professionals in the electrical, security and information technology fields, featuring yearly salaries that are significantly higher than the county average.”
Bestard told WRAL TechWire that the company’s facility will bring high-paying jobs to the region.
“My lowest paid employees, my plant technicians, who make $42,000 per year.” Other positions could earn as much as $500,000 per year, said Bestard, based on the firm’s compensation arrangement.
“Attracting high-tech jobs and new investments to Cumberland County and Fayetteville is a major priority for our community, and this announcement is an indication that we are achieving results,” said Robert Van Geons, CEcD, FCEDC President & CEO. “By opening its regional headquarters here, this cryptocurrency facility shows we are a competitive location for technology-driven operations.”
Bestard said that the company plans to participate in a U.S. Army program, as Fort Bragg is some five miles away from the company’s chosen site location.
“Fort Bragg has an internship program, through the U.S. Army, that we are going to actively going to participate in,” said Bestard. “If a solider can fix a radio in the field, they can fix a crypto miner in a safe facility.”
The facility could support as many as 75 employees, Bestard noted. Statewide, at the four announced facilities, the company could hire as many as 275 people, Bestard said.
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Working with local public utilities
Van Geons noted that the City of Fayetteville, Cumberland County, and the Fayetteville Public Works Commission were all involved in the effort to bring the project to the region.
“What we’re doing, essentially, is bringing down the local community’s power bills,” said Bestard. That’s due to how the company is structured to take advantage of an opportunity to stabilize the local energy grid, Bestard noted.
“One hour a day, Duke Energy charges a much different rate for power,” he said. “What happens is, as a result of us working directly with the utility, is that the utility can purchase more power during the demand response times.”
“When we shut down, they’re able to take the excess energy, and sell it into the public grid,” Bestard explained. “Not only does the utility save money from not having to purchase the energy that we would use during that hour, they’re able to turn around and sell into the Duke grid.”
The CEO and general manager of the Fayetteville Public Works Commission Elaina Ball noted that the announcement is an example of community collaboration.
“Public power is a huge benefit to local economic development,” said Ball. “Plan C Crypto has unique energy requirements, and PWC is able to meet their needs for reliable, affordable electric service in a timeframe that helped facilitate them, not only locating their business in Fayetteville but also redeveloping vacant property,” said Ball.
Bestard noted that one benefit in working within this structure is energy grid stability, including at a substation level.
“For example, and this is something we’re going to be doing directly in Boone, is that at a substation level,” he said. “We become a power-balancing tool, that can be powered down at the substation level, therefore increasing grid stability.”
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Regulation coming for crypto?
The global cryptocurrency market was projected to grow from $910.3 million in 2021 to $1,902.5 million in 2028, with a compound annual growth rate of 11.1% during the forecasted period, a report from Fortune Business Insights found.
“Bitcoin miners search the world for cheap, persistent sources of power,” a cryptocurrency expert who also holds investment in cryptocurrency companies told WRAL TechWire, requesting anonymity. “North Carolina has a number of options based on existing power sources, but there are also great opportunities like PRTI, a pioneer in waste-to-energy bitcoin mining.”
Cryptocurrencies have previously experienced market volatility due to concerns about the power requirements for mining. And, cryptocurrencies have seen a volatile start to the year, as WRAL TechWire has previously reported.
But companies are adapting, and new companies are forming. Companies such as Plan C Crypto, led by Bestard.
“I built this company based on the idea that regulation is coming,” said Bestard. “The data mining community is staring at regulation in the near future.”
But he is building his company, and deepening local relationships, anticipating that there will be regulations coming to the industry.
“From our standpoint, we need to show service to the community, and show what proof of work mining can actually do for electrical grids, and that’s what this company has built itself around,” he noted. North Carolina is a very appealing location for current, and potentially future locations, due to the existing infrastructure and negotiated contracts in the state, said Bestard.
