Name: Texas crypto boom sparks backlash over ‘noise pollution’
Uploaded: 2025-12-21T16:50:45.495Z
Duration: 2 min 47 s
Description: Crypto mines have proliferated in Texas, drawn by cheap land, tax incentives, and a deregulated energy market. Their rapid expansion is causing significant conflict with local communities, particularly over noise pollution.

Crypto mines have proliferated in Texas, drawn by cheap land, tax incentives, and a deregulated energy market. Their rapid expansion is causing significant conflict with local communities, particularly over noise pollution.

Granbury

Residents of Hood County, Texas, are experiencing ongoing noise disturbances from nearby Bitcoin mining operations, with the constant hum of cooling fans affecting their daily lives. Despite economic benefits such as job creation and increased tax revenue, many locals report sleepless nights, declining property values, and unsuccessful efforts to regulate noise through incorporation.

Attempts to address the problem have included lawsuits and noise mitigation measures by the mining company, such as building sound barriers and installing quieter fans. However, with additional AI data centers planned and Texas facing energy supply challenges, community members continue to seek solutions to the unwanted noise.

Texas crypto boom sparks backlash over ‘noise pollution’

There's a lot of noise about Bitcoin in Texas, but here it is Bitcoin making the noise. This sounds like you're standing on a runway, doesn't it? Maybe on the edge of Niagara Falls. But whatever it is, it's not taking off and it's not leaving. A hum is haunting the people of Hood County, a tiny community with a big problem. The noise never stops all day and all night. This is a sound that blasts me every day when I walk out of my back door. This is the neighbor in question, a massive crypto mine next to their homes. The hum is from the cooling fans these centers need to be constantly running. The community is sick. More than just noise, it's a physical bombardment. It's torturous. Bitcoin mines and AI data centers are springing up all over Texas, drawn by cheap power and land plus other incentives. It brings jobs. It can increase the property tax base, which can take some cost away from from homeowners. And it brings a lot of investment. But sleepless nights for some. This was our forever home. Danny's got a great view. For now, another company is trying to build an AI data center over there, and they are even more power hungry than crypto mines. I can't sell my property. I am being taxed at a higher rate now than my property is worth. So the question is, where does this go next? Residents, of course, do not want to leave their homes. The mine over there has no intention of going anywhere anytime soon. Now, locals did have a plan, and that was this one here. See the word incorporate? That would have effectively turned this local community, this small community into a city and getting that status would have allowed them to have noise level laws which could put extra pressure on the mine. But it has just fallen down because they lost that battle. They didn't have enough support. So what happens now? Because it sounds like you're out of options. I don't think we're out of options. I think we have a lot of fight left in us. We do have some more lawsuits that are going. We're waiting for those to play out. One of the issues, energy itself. Texas has a power supply that can be flaky. Extreme weather, extreme problems with blackouts common, but still they come. This is as close as you can get to the mine from the road. Now, that's not actually the building itself. That's a huge wall that the operators put up to try to keep the noise inside. It's also replaced a number of the fans with models it says are much quieter. Here's what it told us in a statement. We've invested over $320 million locally and more than $1.2 billion across Texas, supporting 35 plus jobs and generating millions in annual tax revenue. We remain committed to being good neighbors. It is the sound of making money. For these residents, it is a cost they never agreed to pay. Phil Lavelle, Al Jazeera, Granbury, Texas.

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