Iris Energy Boosts Bitcoin Production by 10% in August Despite Rising Difficulty

Iris Energy has reported a 10% jump in its August bitcoin production compared to July despite rising network hashrate over the past month.

On Thursday, the Australia-headquartered bitcoin mining and data center operator announced that it mined 245 BTC in August coinciding with bitcoin’s average monthly hashrate climbing to 630 EH/s.

The increased difficulty led to a decline in bitcoin’s daily production benchmark to an all-time low of 0.72 BTC/EH/s in August. Despite this, Iris Energy’s realized hashrate reached 10.9 EH/s, marking a 14% increase from July.

The production growth was driven by the activation of newly arrived bitcoin miners from previous orders. By August’s end, Iris Energy said it had 16 EH/s of installed hashrate, a jump from 10.5 EH/s as of July 31.

A hashrate realization rate of 68% indicates that the majority of newly activated miners were plugged in during the latter part of August. This suggests that the company is likely to report another increase in bitcoin production for September.

Iris Energy also announced a significant reduction in its electricity cost, dropping from $61,677 per BTC in July to $29,958 in August. This was achieved by closing its energy hedging contracts, although the transaction incurred a one-time financial loss of $7.2 million.

Previously, Iris Energy attributed the electricity price surge in July to higher energy hedge pricing during the summer in Texas, but with "much lower than expected energy market volatility." This limited energy trading opportunities for the company, leading to the closure of the contracts for August and September, resulting in a $7.2 million loss.