3 weeks ago
Paraguay’s state‑owned energy monopoly, Administración Nacional de Electricidad (ANDE), has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with infrastructure steadfast Morphware to motorboat a government‑run Bitcoin mining programme powered by thousands of confiscated mining machines and surplus hydroelectric power.
In a first‑of‑its‑kind move, Paraguay authorities powerfulness institution is astir to go a Bitcoin miner. ANDE has signed a ceremonial statement with Morphware to to physique a state‑run mining programme that uses 2 things the state already has successful abundance: seized mining rigs and inexpensive hydroelectric powerfulness from the Itaipú dam.
In practice, ANDE volition big and ain the mining operations. Instead of exporting that vigor astatine low, treaty‑defined prices, the inferior volition way portion of it into Bitcoin mining facilities it controls. Morphware volition enactment arsenic a method advisor alternatively than a speculative partner: according to Morphware laminitis and CEO Kenso Trabing, due to the fact that ANDE has nary acquisition mining Bitcoin, the company’s relation volition beryllium “an advisory one.
The aviator signifier volition plug successful astir 1,500 seized miners astatine existing inferior buildings located adjacent to substations, which tin beryllium converted into basal mining facilities with ventilation, transformers, organisation units, and due metering.
Seizing Background
This determination follows a bid of nationwide raids since aboriginal 2024, arsenic ANDE moved against unmetered and fraudulent high‑voltage connections utilized by amerciable miners. Most of the machines going into this programme were seized betwixt May and June 2024, erstwhile authorities intensified inspections successful mining hotspots.
In Salto del Guairá alone, ANDE confiscated 2,738 mining rigs aft detecting an unmetered high‑load transportation worthy astir 1.1 cardinal guaraníes (around 146,000 dollars) successful stolen powerfulness each month, alongside dozens of akin operations that pushed the full stockpile of seized ASICs adjacent to 30,000 units.
Another State Turning To Bitcoin
Paraguay’s determination slots into a tiny but increasing radical of states that look to beryllium trying to crook vigor argumentation into hash rate. El Salvador has already folded Bitcoin into its authoritative toolkit, pointing geothermal powerfulness from state‑run plants into mining facilities and adding those coins to a government‑controlled BTC stockpile alongside its “volcano bond” ambitions, as reported by our sister website Bitcoinist. Further east, Bhutan’s sovereign wealthiness money has softly operated hydro‑powered mining since astatine slightest 2019, utilizing surplus energy from its dams to accumulate Bitcoin connected the kingdom’s equilibrium expanse and, more recently, to backmost caller digital‑asset and “mindfulness city” projects.
Paraguay’s ANDE–Morphware experimentation is the hydro‑rich, Latin American mentation of that aforesaid playbook: support the vigor domestic, ain the infrastructure, and fto the state, not conscionable backstage miners, seizure the upside.
Cover representation from ChatGPT, BTCUSD illustration from Tradingview
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