Australian crypto miner Iris Energy (IREN) secured a 600-megawatt connection for a new Texas crypto mining facility, the company said on Friday.

• The company said in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that it has executed a binding connection agreement with utility provider AEP Texas.
• Iris Energy paid $19 million for the security deposit and the connection fee, the filing said. The data centers in Texas are expected to be energized in Q1 2023, said the miner.
• Iris Energy has secured a 300 acre freehold site in the Texas Panhandle, the state’s northernmost region, which will be connected directly to the grid through a 345kV transmission line, the filing said.
• Iris Energy recorded a hashrate of 748 petahash per second (PH/s) in December 2021. It plans to add 2.9 EH/s across two sites in British Columbia, with mining rigs it has already secured, by the end of 2022. Another 11.6 EH/s are planned for 2023, including 10.6 EH/s in the Panhandle facility.
• The company could add another 7 EH/s in the Texas facility if it secures more mining rigs, bringing its total computing power to 22 EH/s – almost 14% of the bitcoin network’s current hashrate.

Read more: Iris Energy’s December Hashrate Rises 14% as Revenue Falls Again