Can New York ban crypto mining in the region?

The state of New York is pushing forward a bill that sets to put a blanket ban on Proof-of-Work mining (PoW) because of the electricity and energy costs associated with crypto mining. As the bill is pushed forward, the cryptocurrency community, including strong figures in the space, have lashed out against the ban.

On Twitter, the head of policy at Blockchain Association Jake Chervinsky dove in to explain that the political wing of the New York establishment with an anti-crypto stance will not do anything to reduce carbon emissions by slapping a mining ban in place. He explained, instead, that all it will do will push those in the Bitcoin mining industry to mine in other regions where the state of New York will not be able to dictate their mining.

1/ As the anti-bitcoin wing of the NY political establishment takes a victory lap over the passage of its mining ban, remember:

It will not help reduce carbon emissions by a single ounce.

All it does is push miners to build in other places where NY has no influence over them.

— Jake Chervinsky (@jchervinsky) June 5, 2022

He continued in the thread to note

“At best, it has zero impact on emissions…but more likely has a net negative effect by pushing miners to build in places with fewer or no environmental regulations.”

In response to the bill, Chervinsky has stated that he hopes Kathy Hochul, the New York governor, will veto the bill to avoid sending a message that New York is taking an anti-cryptocurrency stance.

Bruce Fenton, United States senatorial candidate, has also taken to the social media platform to note his disagreement with the bill.

No government has the right to tell you what software to run.

Code is speech. https://t.co/mm1Ndd75im

— Bruce Fenton for US Senate 🇺🇸 (@brucefenton) June 4, 2022

Additionally, Ethereum’s Vitalik Buterin took to Twitter to agree that the state should not be in a position to ban crypto mining for the sake of energy,

Ultimately I agree with this (that is, I oppose banning PoW). The government picking and choosing which specific applications are an okay use of electricity or not is a bad idea. Better to just implement carbon pricing, and use some of the revenues to compensate low-income users. https://t.co/NnBzmv5mYz

— vitalik.eth (@VitalikButerin) June 4, 2022

The New York State Senate approved the bill to ban PoW mining on 3rd of June and will be put into place effectively if the governor of the state approves it.