The City of Abilene in Texas has announced a partnership with Lancium to build a 200MW Bitcoin farm in Taylor County, which it hopes will create a capital investment of $2.4 billion and local benefits of $1 billion over the next 20 years.
Project Artemis is described as a "renewable energy power data center campus" to be built on around 800 acres of land around Spinks Road and Summerhill Road in Taylor County. It will be built by Lancium, a company that promises to locate computing resources at points in the electric grid which might be overloaded by renewable energy, and use them for Bitcoin mining when there is a surplus, acting as a "controllable load resource."
The Development Corporation of Abilene (DCOA) believes the facility can grow from 200MW to 1GW over the next 20 years. Lancium says its customers will invest $2.4 billion over 20 years, of which nearly $1 billion will benefit the city - with some 57 jobs created. This requires cryptocurrencies to maintain a high value.
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The Project will start with 100,000 square feet of industrial electrical services equipment and data servers, and will be Lancium's second Clean Campus, following a similar site in Stockton Texas, which broke ground in September and is expected to be on stream in early 2022.
It's the largest project in the history of Abilene and Taylor County, according to KTXS, which reports Taylor County Judge Downing Bolls saying: “We are proud to be at the forefront of this movement that will utilize and revitalize 800 acres of land. This partnership is historic with Lancium’s projected investment of approximately $2.4 billion in improvements to real property in the County.”
The project was announced at a city council meeting on Friday and established the site as a reinvestment zone which will be annexed into the Abilene city limits. This week the project was granted tax abatement.
Lancium will make an annual payment of $486,000 to the city in lieu of taxes for 20 years, giving the city a total of $9.7 million in funds over that time.
City Manager Robert Hanna described the project as a "unicorn" according to Abilene Reporter News: "Once the first 10-year tax term is abated, we'll be able to receive tax revenues off of that first term," said Hanna. "That will be in addition to the [payment in lieu[."
The Project is expected to help Abilene and Taylor County become a major provider of renewable energy, by using revenue from the Bitcoin mining to fund further generation capacity.
Misty Mayo, President and CEO of the DCOA. said: “Lancium’s development is a tremendous opportunity to ensure the viability of the community for years to come through the diversification of our economy. Over the next 20-years, this project is estimated to bring $993.4 million in total projected economic impact to Taylor County and the City of Abilene. This is the exact kind of opportunity the DCOA is tasked to find and win for our community.”
“We are very proud to be part of the community and build one of our flagship Clean Campuses in Abilene,” said Michael McNamara, Co-founder and CEO of Lancium. “We chose Abilene for our second Clean Campus because of its ideal location, proximity to abundant wind and solar generation, high-quality workforce and the opportunities to grow in the future. We want to thank the city, county and all of the members of the economic development team that worked together to help make this significant milestone possible.”
An additional $2.5 million has been set aside by the DCOA for wastewater and water infrastructure.
