Volcano Energy has announced $1 billion in commitments to build a 241-megawatt (MW) bitcoin mine in the Metapán region of El Salvador, according to a Monday press release on Twitter. The mining site will be powered with 169 MW of solar and 72 MW of wind energy to bring computing power of over 1.3 exahash/second (EH/s). One of the investors is Tether, the issuer of stablecoin USDT, according to a separate press release shared with journalists.
The government of El Salvador will play a crucial role in planning and execution and has secured a preferred participation equivalent to 23% of revenues, said Volcano. The outside investors will own 27% of the venture and the remaining 50% will be reinvested to expand energy production and mining capacities, the firm said.
Tether has been trying to diversify its strategic ecosystem and Volcano Energy represents one of the most ground-breaking initiatives it has backed, said Chief Technology Officer Paolo Ardoino. The stablecoin issuer has been busy on the investment front in the past few weeks, including on bitcoin mining in Uruguay and purchasing bitcoin to add to its reserves backing USDT.
As opportunities for new developments have been limited in North America, mining firms and others have been looking elsewhere for investments in places such as Latin America and the Middle East.