To date, Iceland remains the most popular region in Europe for crypto-miners. However, the cost of electricity in Sweden and Norway is lower, which makes them more attractive for mining.
The cost of a kilowatt hour in Iceland is 8 euro cents, in Sweden 6.5 euro cents, in Norway 7.1 euro cents, while the average price in Europe is 11 euro cents.
The Swedish company Vattenfall [VATN.UL] and the Norwegian Statkraft [STATKF.UL] are the dominant energy companies in their countries. And although the provision of facilities for miners is just a tiny part of their current business, both companies see this as a great opportunity.
According to Morgan Stanley forecasts, this year the electricity consumption by miners will increase to 130 terawatt * hours, which corresponds to the energy consumption of Argentina or the predicted use of all electric vehicles in the world by the mid-2020s.
Olivier Roussy Newton, director and co-founder of the Canadian group of companies HIVE Blockchain Technologies (HIVE.V), which began broadcasting in Sweden in January, said that they plan to increase production capacity from 17.4 to 26.8 megawatts because of constantly increasing demands.
In March, American mining company Bitfury opened a new data center in Norway worth $ 35 million. The company will buy 350 gigawatts of "clean" energy hours from a local renewable energy supplier Helgeland Kraft [HKRAT.UL].
The Chinese company Bitmain, which recently established a division in Switzerland, is also exploring the potential of Sweden and Norway.
China accounts for about 70 percent of the production of cryptocurrency, but in Beijing it is concerned about environmental pollution from coal energy, which is by far the main way to extract electricity in China. This forced the mining companies to look for cheap sources of electricity elsewhere.
In Norway, hydropower accounts for more than 99% of electricity production, while in Sweden their number is about 40 percent.