Iris Energy Limited (NASDAQ:IREN) has announced plans to expand its green energy-powered Bitcoin mining operation to 9.1 exahashes per second (EH/s) and revitalize its high-performance computing (HPC) data center strategy.
Phase 1 of construction is underway at the company’s facility in Childress, Texas to add 80 Megawatts (MW) in the form of four 20 MW data centers. This is expected to expand data center capacity from 5.6 EH/s to ~9.1 EH/s1 by early 2024.
Shares of Iris Energy surged 19% to $4.07 in mid-afternoon trading on Tuesday.
Looking ahead, long-lead items have been ordered to unlock roughly 13.6 EH/s1, which the company is calling Phase 2.
Iris Energy also said its HPC data center strategy is now a parallel focus. Back in 2020, the company signed a strategic memorandum of understanding with Dell Technologies to test and develop potential data center solutions for energy-intensive compute applications.
Now, “recent discussions with market participants have further validated this previous work and that the time may be right to expand into this sector,” the company said in a statement.
This could involve utilizing Iris Energy’s four existing operating sites and/or its geographically diversified portfolio of additional global sites currently under development.
Meanwhile, the company noted that it has $64 million in cash with no debt and operation cash flows from its current 5.6 EH/s of Bitcoin mining.
Contact Andrew Kessel at andrew.kessel@proactiveinvestors.com
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