Minnesota company withdraws Pitt County crypto proposal due to community concerns
Amid staunch opposition from the surrounding community, a Minnesota company on Monday withdrew a permit application that would have allowed it to build a data center primarily used to mine crypto currency in a diverse rural community just outside Greenville.
Compute North was seeking a special use permit to build 89 modular containers filled with computer hardware that would run virtually constantly, requiring 1,246 high-powered fans to prevent them from overheating. The facility, whose primary use likely would have been mining crypto currency, would have been located within 1,000 feet of some homes and about 2,000 feet from Belvoir Elementary, raising concerns about constant noise.
“This area has always been peaceful and quiet and we do not want this noise invasion from Compute North,” Jacqueline Prayer, whose family has long owned land behind Belvoir Elementary and holds reunions there, said last Friday. “And anyone that approves of this exposure, let us take it in your neighborhood. Let us take it to you.”
Late last week, there were signs reading “We say NO to Crypto!” in many front yards in the area. Many residents openly questioned whether Belvoir was selected for the facility because of its high proportion of poor and marginalized residents.
Compute North officials maintained they chose the location because of its close proximity to a Greenville Utilities substation, giving it easy access to large amounts of reliable electricity and because the property under consideration sits near U.S. 264, which company officials believed would limit the noise impact. The company also said that it planned to follow the county’s noise ordinance.
But at about 3 p.m. Monday, just hours before the Pitt County Board of Commissioners was set to resume a hearing on the public use permit, Compute North announcing its intention to “pursue an alternative location” for the facility.
“With support from our local partners, we remain optimistic about receiving approval to commence with building a new data center facility in Eastern North Carolina, bringing benefits to the local economy and power grid,” the Compute North statement read.
Crypto mining in NC
Crypto mining is a process in which networks of high-powered computers work to verify transactions of currencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum. It is called “mining” because the user who first solves a complicated formula that verifies the transaction will receive a set amount of the currency, something that is supposed to happen once every 10 minutes. Environmental groups have criticized crypto mining because of the large amounts of energy required to run thousands of servers and fans simultaneously.
Had the facility been built, it would have immediately become Greenville Utilities’ largest customer, larger than East Carolina University or Vidant Medical Center. At full capacity, the Compute North Facility would have used 150 megawatts of energy, according to its special use permit application.
Compute North officials had said they were prepared to invest about $54 million in the Belvoir location, which would have brought 27 jobs to the area with an average annual salary of about $56,000.
Monday’s outcome was similar to that of a proposed crypto mine near Asheboro earlier this year. Like in Belvoir, rural neighbors expressed concerns about the impact of noise from the constantly running computers and cooling devices.
In Asheboro’s case, the application was pulled before a hearing of the Randolph County Planning Board. The public hearing for the proposed Belvoir rezoning actually started in mid-October and was left open before Compute North decided to withdraw its application.
The Asheboro crypto proposal has not re-emerged.
There are at least two crypto mines operating in North Carolina, including a Core Scientific operation based in a former Levi’s plant near the Tennessee state line in Marble, N.C., and another in Franklinton powering its computers by breaking down tires. The company behind a proposed mine in Asheboro withdrew a rezoning proposal amid community opposition earlier this year, with many residents citing noise concerns similar to those in Belvoir.
Compute North maintained that its data processing centers have uses other than crypto mining, but that claim was met with significant skepticism in Pitt County.
Equity and noise concerns
Community members worried that the Compute North facility would cause a constant hum every time they or their children stepped outside.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the 1,799-resident census tract surrounding the site includes 622 people who identify as Black and 583 who identify as Hispanic.
Maria Cortez, who lives on nearby Hardy Road, wondered aloud Friday if the site was chosen because of the surrounding area’s high Hispanic population. Belvoir Elementary is at the heart of Cortez’s concerns because her children attended the school and she knows that her grandchildren will, too.
“Most of my family that have been at Belvoir have returned to be teachers at Belvoir, and I’m allowed to defend Belvoir because it’s part of me, it’s part of my family,” Cortez said in Spanish.
Jeff Jackson, Compute North’s Minneapolis-based vice president of site selection, said Monday that allegations that the site was chosen because of the surrounding community’s makeup are not true. In explaining its selection, Compute North has pointed to highway near its proposed site and the substation.
Jackson previously said that the company would mitigate any noise impacts by installing silencers on air intake and exhausts for each of the 89 containers holding servers. The company also stood prepared to build 24-foot sound walls that Jackson likened to those used beside highways.
“It has no material impact on the surrounding environment,” Jackson said Monday, adding that the facility would not have any emissions or water discharge.
Others proposed to the computing facility don’t want it anywhere in Pitt County, pointing to the immense quantities of energy used.
Lucy Fox, whose daughter is in second grade at Belvoir, said, “I don’t want it to hurt my child, but if I didn’t have a kid in the school, I would be opposed to it because it’s bad for the environment. And it’s not like it’s a water treatment plant or something that does something good.”
Rodney Cogdell’s family has farmed a tract in Belvoir for generations. They grow watermelons and cabbage and have a scuppernong grape vine that people frequently pick fruit straight off of. Sometimes, Cogdell said, he comes home and just sits, looking at the trees.
Cogdell was worried that Compute North coming in would change the nature of the place, an industrial infringement on a community he describes as “country.”
“Now we have a question of value,” Cogdell said, “where we have to choose between our comfort of living and dollar signs.”
For Cogdell and his Belvoir neighbors, comfort prevailed on Monday.
This story was produced with financial support from 1Earth Fund, in partnership with Journalism Funding Partners, as part of an independent journalism fellowship program. The N&O maintains full editorial control of the work.
This story was originally published November 2, 2021 at 1:43 PM.