PANews reported on January 26th that, according to Cointelegraph, the hashrate of the Foundry USA Bitcoin mining pool has been reduced by approximately 60% since last Friday due to the impact of the winter storm "Fern" in the United States. Data shows that its hashrate has decreased by nearly 200 EH/s, and it currently still controls approximately 198 EH/s of hashrate, accounting for 23% of the total hashrate of global mining pools. This reduction has resulted in a temporary increase in its block time to approximately 12 minutes.
The storm has swept across many parts of the United States, causing power outages for over one million residents. Other mining pools serving US users, including Luxor, have also reduced their hashrate to alleviate pressure on the power grid infrastructure. Bitcoin mining, as a controllable load resource, can be shut down during peak grid demand and turned on during low demand, thus helping to balance the grid load. The current storm is affecting parts of the southeastern, northeastern, and midwestern United States.
