Arkansas Passes Groundbreaking Crypto Mining Regulation Bills

Two bills regulating crypto mining in the American state of Arkansas have now crossed the State's House of Representatives completely and are proceeding to the Governor's office, the last step before they become law.

Saturday's reports said the Arkansas House of Representatives approved Senate Bills 78 and 79 that would limit cryptocurrency mining activities within the state.

Among others, Senate Bill 78 introduced a limit on the noise produced by crypto mining farms, regulated and cooled with water by those farms. Most importantly, the bill has set a limit where the mining operation should not be owned by foreigners and it restored the local government power to control mining operations.

Senate Bill 79 would establish a State licensing and regulatory system, regulating oil and gas wells under the Department of Energy and Environment with the Oil and Gas Commission.

The two bills now go to the desk of Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders, whose office said she will sign them into law.

These two bills will amend the Arkansas Data Centers Act of 2023, which passed in the Arkansas legislature in an effort to provide some protections to mining sites.

It occasioned much debate in April. Actually, on 22nd April, both bills were tabled. It evoked much debate, more so one of the bills, which had been highly restrictive in local government's ability to regulate the mining operation practices to the extent that they had even raised anger and protest from affected rural communities.

"The Arkansas Advocate reported that the House sponsor of Bill 79, Jeremiah Moore, described the state as having an emerging mining industry and further added, 'We've never seen anything like this in our state before.' ".

A Sanders spokesman told the Arkansas Advocate that the governor "strongly supports outlawing foreign adversaries from owning crypto mines in Arkansas while protecting rural communities and empowering them to crack down on bad actors.".

United States has become a center of heated debate over crypto mining. In April, the Biden Administration became tougher over the operations over crypto mining, mentioning China as a role model country for the United States.