The Unrelenting Roar of a Crypto Mine Tore This Town Apart

Cryptocurrency aims to revolutionize finance, but its mines are destroying communities across America.

- By Wudan Yan. Photography by Juan Diego Reyes

It was nearly midnight in late April when Lynell Morris's husband, Michael, returned home after a shift at work.

As he fumbled his keys, the motion-sensing light on their front doorstep flicked on. His eye caught a glint of gold: a .22 bullet on his doormat. It seemed odd as he and Lynell own a different-caliber firearm. Nevertheless, he brought it inside and set it on their kitchen table.

A few days later, he remembered to ask Lynell about it. Immediately, she yelped, "Politics!" Neither Lynell nor Michael is running for office. But over the last few months, Lynell had become enmeshed in local politics after a cryptocurrency mine set up shop in their town of Murphy, North Carolina, in September 2021. "Mine" is a misnomer, as these facilities are clusters of computing units, solving complex problems to help transact and generate virtual currency, with large-and noisy-fans to cool them.

Sitting in the foothills of the Appalachian and Blue Ridge Mountains, Murphy is a lush oasis promising an uninterrupted soundtrack of nature, and attracting those who value that quiet. Within weeks of when the mine began running, angry residents started complaining about the incessant noise on Facebook and Nextdoor. They likened this new, pervasive sound to a highway, a jet engine on the runway, or a semi idling in their driveway, and said it was disrupting their sleep and eroding their sense of peace.