In the great temple of hearings, where the air is perfumed with a splash of coffee and the chairs squeak like a chorus of disgruntled pianos, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse-one of those gentlemen who wears his conscience on his sleeve and a tie that could double as a sail-proclaimed, with a flourish, that crypto mining is fanning the climate flames and that a reckoning is not merely on the horizon but tapping at the door in stout boots. 🕰️🔥
Calls For Accountability In Crypto And AI
In April, Whitehouse, joined by his fellow Democrat John Fetterman, rolled out the Cloud Act-a bill pitched as a sensible caper to set emissions standards for AI and cryptocurrency mining facilities. The aim, as one might gently suppose, was to ease the electric bills for ordinary folks while coaxing money into clean energy with all the panache of a benevolent banker. ⚡💸
Eleanor Terret, reporting from the bustling hub of X (formerly known as Twitter), relayed Whitehouse’s appeal to industry bigwigs: consider what your schemes do to the ordinary electricity consumer who lives nearby. “Think about what you’re doing to regular consumers of electricity nearby,” he declaimed with the gusto of a man who has tasted both pepper and prudence. 😅
Whitehouse also urged a moment of solemn reflection on the consequences of choice, warning that the path ahead could lead society further down a rather shady climate lane. 🤨
Senator Ron Wyden, the panel’s ranking member, expressed his gratitude for the remarks, while Senator Marsha Blackburn politely dismissed Whitehouse’s musings as irrelevant-a classic case of “different horses for different courses,” or so one might imagine. 🐴
Attention Shifts To Clarity Act
Whitehouse has been the town crier about the strain exerted by energy-hungry data centers and crypto mines on the power grid. He noted that these operations push up electricity costs for ordinary people, hobble access to power for homes and small businesses, and puff out fossil-fuel emissions like a chimney on a windy day. “The good news is that we don’t have to choose between leading the world on AI and leading the world on climate safety,” he quipped, perhaps with a twinkle of theatrical optimism. He maintains that tech outfits have the funds to invest in clean energy alternatives, thereby sparing the grid from further burdens. 🧑💼💡
The Clean Cloud Act aims to nudge the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to set emissions performance standards for data centers and crypto mining facilities with an installed IT power capacity exceeding 100 kilowatts. 🏛️
These standards would hinge on regional grid emissions intensities and would shrink by 11% each year. The bill also proposes penalties for emissions that exceed the standards, starting at $20 per ton of CO2 equivalent, with the usual annual adjustments for inflation. 💰🧊
Despite the urgency in Whitehouse’s oratory, progress on the Clean Cloud Act has stalled as Congress turns its attention to the Clarity Act. ⏳
This market-structure bill aims to illuminate the regulatory landscape for digital assets by delineating the roles of the SEC and the CFTC, classifying digital assets, and laying down fresh protections for developers in the DeFi domain. 🤹♂️
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2025-10-03 10:14