Bitcoin’s network power fell this week, falling below the 1-zetahash level for the first time in months. According to the report, the 7-day average hashrate is close to 993EH/s, a clear decline from last year’s highs.
thirst for power
According to the report, large AI data centers are willing to buy long-term power contracts and pay more for reliable power that lasts around the clock, forcing some miners to halt or shift operations. This competition has changed who can get the cheapest power from the grid.
Some publicly traded miners are closing deals to lease space to chipmakers and AI companies and converting parts of their sites into AI data centers. A large mining company has signed a multi-year lease with a major chip company, underscoring how companies are hedging against volatile mining profits.
On Monday, StandardHash CEO and founder Leon Lyu said at
Why change matters now
Electricity is the biggest cost of mining. When data centers bid for the same megawatts, miners must choose whether to pay more, accept tighter margins, or repurpose capacity.
Bitcoin Hash Rate Alert: Changes to the Mining Environment 📉
For the first time since September 2025, BTC’s 7-day average hashrate fell below 1ZH/s. A -4.34% difficulty adjustment is expected in ~3 days.
What is driving the escape? 🧵
1️⃣ AI pivot: Major mining companies… pic.twitter.com/hg8O8xBIkx
— Leon Liu (@LeonLyuLv) January 19, 2026
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The reduction in hashing power alleviates some of the difficulty of the network, keeping block times roughly constant, but mechanical modifications do not change who holds the power contracts.
PJM, a grid operator serving the mid-Atlantic region, moved quickly to propose rules to address surging AI demand.
The plan calls on large new electricity users to take responsibility for their own supply or accept curtailment rules to avoid disruption to essential services and homes. The move is intended to limit the strain that rapid AI growth can place on the system.
Image: JHUEngineering
Bitcoin Vs. AI: Policy movements and political pressures
President Donald Trump and several state leaders have called for action to make technology companies pay more to secure power, including a proposed emergency auction to finance new power plants.
These pressures reflect concerns about higher costs and the risk that data center expansion could crowd out other users.
What miners do to survive
Many operators not only shut down equipment when power costs are high; They are revamping their site to host GPUs and other AI hardware.
These changes could mean more stable returns and longer contracts than mining alone provides. This also means structural change. Bitcoin mining is becoming part of some companies’ broader computing businesses.
Block rewards and protocol rules still secure the network. But if hash rates remain low for long, promoters and investors will be watching to see whether centralization increases where power remains cheap.
For regular users, the system continues to generate blocks. For miners, electricity competition has now become a critical business issue.
Featured image from Unsplash, chart from TradingView
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