Key facts
- Fortitude has brought a 12-megawatt mining facility in Grand Island, Nebraska, online.
- This expansion increases Fortitude's owned power portfolio to over 60 megawatts across seven sites.
- The company expects the new facility to reduce its direct cash cost of mining Zcash from approximately $70 to $40 per coin.
- The savings are attributed to lower-cost owned power and more efficient mining hardware.
- The facility is designed to operate as an interruptible load, purchasing electricity for about $0.045 per kilowatt-hour.
- Fortitude plans to go public through a business combination with HeartSciences.
Zcash mining company Fortitude has activated a 12-megawatt data center in Grand Island, Nebraska, marking the completion of its first greenfield facility and expanding its owned power capacity to over 60 megawatts across seven sites. This development is a significant step towards Fortitude's planned public listing through its merger with HeartSciences, a publicly traded medical technology firm.
CEO Andrea Childs emphasized Fortitude's strategy of owning its power assets, stating it provides flexibility and aligns incentives better than leasing capacity. The company projects that the new facility will reduce its direct cash cost of mining Zcash from approximately $70 per coin to around $40 per coin, assuming successful equipment deployment and stable market conditions. These savings are expected to come from lower electricity costs, with the facility purchasing power at about $0.045 per kilowatt-hour, and the deployment of next-generation mining hardware.
The Nebraska facility is strategically located between solar generation sites and near a substation with excess capacity, allowing it to operate as a flexible grid resource that can reduce consumption during peak demand periods. Fortitude, which emerged from Digital Currency Group's mining division Foundry, aims to reinvest mining profits into expanding its infrastructure. Childs views Zcash as being at a different, more opportune stage than Bitcoin for mining, believing its vertically integrated structure positions Fortitude to benefit from Zcash's future growth.
The expansion occurs amid increased competition for low-cost power due to rising demand from AI data centers. Fortitude's approach of developing and owning its sites aims to control power costs directly, differentiating it from operators reliant on third-party vendors. Grand Island officials noted the facility was designed to be a flexible grid resource with limited community impact.