Public Bitcoin miners are developing roughly 30 gigawatts of artificial intelligence-focused power capacity, nearly triple the 11 GW currently online, as they seek to offset post-halving margin pressure and reposition for the next growth cycle.
The planned expansion, compiled by TheEnergyMag across 14 publicly traded miners, highlights a rapid pivot away from pure hashpower growth toward AI and high-performance computing infrastructure amid persistently weak hashprice conditions.
“This is the megawatt arms race of the AI boom,”
TheEnergyMag said, warning that monetisation ultimately depends on whether AI demand remains strong enough to justify the scale of investment.
Although the 30 GW pipeline amounts to what the publication described as “a small country’s worth of power infrastructure,” much of the capacity remains in development queues and early-stage plans rather than operational data centres, shifting competition from ASIC efficiency to securing power, financing and timely delivery.
One early beneficiary of the AI pivot is HIVE Digital, which reported fourth-quarter revenue of $93.1 million, up 219% year on year, driven in part by contributions from AI and high-performance computing workloads despite softer bitcoin prices.
Investor pressure is also mounting, with Starboard Value urging Riot Platforms to accelerate its expansion into AI and HPC data centres as mining margins tighten.
The diversification push follows the 2024 halving that cut block rewards and squeezed profitability, compounded by bitcoin’s retreat from above $126,000 to below $60,000, though US-based miners have shown resilience with output rebounding after winter storm disruptions earlier this year.
At the time of reporting, Bitcoin price was $67,209.39.