Turkish cryptocurrency firm iMiner has received authorization to mine digital coins and provide custody as well as trading services in Iran.
The Iranian Ministry of Industry, Mine and Trade’s recently issued charter will enable iMiner to operate a bitcoin mining farm in Semnan, a city located in central Iran. The charter allows the company’s bitcoin farm to operate at a rate of 96,000 terahash per second. Hashrate is the main measure of a bitcoin miner’s performance and computing power.
iMiner’s farm will use 6,000 machines to mine cryptocurrencies. With an investment equivalent to $7.3 million US, the bitcoin mining firm will be the largest in Iran. iMiner is known for its expertise in providing custody and related back-office services in Canada, Turkey, Russia, and the USA.
Cryptocurrency mining is gaining popularity in Iran thanks to subsidized power rates, especially among individuals and organizations from France, Ukraine, and China. Despite the demand, the Iranian government has taken a slow approach to avoid straining the country’s national power grid.
The process of Bitcoin mining uses power intensive software to solve complicated math problems, which in turn validate cryptocurrency transactions. The miner who successfully solves the math problem receives a bitcoin reward as compensation. The transaction then becomes part of the digital ledger of blockchain.
In 2019, the Energy Ministry of Iran released a power consumption report that flagged the province of Semnan for high utility use. The tiny province’s consumption exceeded that of Khuzestan, which dealt with high temperatures.
Nations with low electricity rates like Iran and China have become leaders in cryptocurrency mining over the past few years. Cheap energy makes bitcoin mining feasible, given the amount of power required to operate and cool cryptocurrency mining hardware.