On February 20, the Brazilian Commerce Council introduced a technical decision decreasing import duties to zero for a slim class of {hardware}: SHA256 Bitcoin miners that exceed 200 terahashes per second and have an vitality effectivity of lower than 20 joules per terahash.
Three days later, French state-run vitality big Engie instructed Reuters it was contemplating putting in a bitcoin miner at its 895-megawatt Assu Sol plant in northeastern Brazil, the world’s largest photo voltaic farm, to monetize diminished energy and enhance profitability.
The 2 developments land inside 72 hours of one another, and collectively they sketch a thesis that the majority observers have missed. It’s constructing a strain valve for renewable vitality that Brazil is caught with, and Bitcoin mining is the discharge mechanism.
This isn’t a narrative about “legalizing” mining in Brazil or launching a nationwide technique. It is concerning the quiet convergence of three forces: continual reductions, decreasing {hardware} value boundaries, and breaking generator economics.
Collectively, these create the circumstances for incremental hashrate to circulate in the direction of markets that nobody is being attentive to.
Discount issues that Bitcoin miners can clear up
Brazil’s wind business diminished energy era by about 32 terawatt-hours from October 2021 to September 2025, with income losses for wind farms amounting to about 6 billion reais (roughly $1.2 billion).
Suppression happens when the ability grid is unable to soak up the ability that’s being generated, both within the fallacious place, on the fallacious time, or with inadequate transmission capability. For renewable turbines, the megawatt-hours saved destroy worth.
In 2024, wind and solar energy will generate 24% of Brazil’s electrical energy, and in August 2025, their share will attain 34% for the primary time.
Grid operator ONS stated the cuts weren’t a short lived friction, however a structural function of a system with a excessive proportion of variable renewable vitality.
The mismatch will increase because the share of renewable vitality will increase and transmission ramp-up is delayed. Turbines require a regionally dispatchable demand that may take in wasted electrons and switch them on and off rapidly. Bitcoin mining matches precisely that profile.
Engie’s Assu Sol plant is positioned in northeastern Brazil, an space with robust photo voltaic radiation however restricted penetration.
The corporate instructed Reuters it might make the ability extra worthwhile by monetizing the vitality financial savings from extraction and storage, however harassed that this may take a number of years.
This sign is vital as a result of it comes from a state-owned European energy firm that has no earlier publicity to cryptocurrencies and positions mining purely as an industrial demand response instrument.
How tax modifications will really have an effect on Bitcoin miners
Decision GECEX 861, issued on February 20, amends Brazil’s Consolidated Exempted Tariff Checklist to zero import duties on sure data expertise merchandise.
Annex I provides a brand new line overlaying servers devoted to cryptocurrency mining utilizing the SHA256 algorithm with vitality effectivity measured at 35 levels Celsius, lower than 20 Joules per terahash, and processing energy of over 200 terahashes per second.
The zero % tariff is in impact till January 31, 2028.
This isn’t a blanket exemption for all mining {hardware}. High-level ASIC threshold filter. Older or much less environment friendly fashions aren’t eligible. This coverage targets {hardware} courses that may really compete at scale in skilled mining environments.
Brazil’s import tax construction is notoriously multi-layered. Import duties are one part of the overall landed value, together with IPI, PIS/COFINS-Import, ICMS, and numerous charges. Commerce logistics guides usually state that complete import burden charges vary from 40% to 100%.
Decreasing import duties to zero removes one federal lever, however not your complete stack.
However, Brazil has diminished key value boundaries and shortened payback intervals for high-efficiency mining {hardware}, regardless that different taxes stay.
Break-even electrical energy value to attain this
Mining profitability is set by three variables: hash value (income per terahash per second per day), {hardware} effectivity, and energy value.
As of February 16, Hashrate Index is reporting a hash value of roughly $34.05 per petahash per day. Bitcoin traded at almost $64,000 on February twenty third.
For a rig that meets the minimal necessities below Ex 040, 20 joules per terahash and 200 terahash per second equates to roughly $6.81 in income per day. Energy consumption is 4.0 kilowatts. Power utilization is 96 kilowatt hours per day.
The break-even electrical energy value, ignoring capital and working bills, is roughly $0.071 per kilowatt-hour.
Changing to reais utilizing the February 23 trade price of roughly 5.17 reais per greenback, the break-even level is roughly 370 reais per megawatt hour. Retail electrical energy costs in Brazil averaged R$0.657 per kilowatt hour as of June 2025, which is just too excessive for mining.
Nonetheless, with wholesale spot costs typically buying and selling within the vary of 250 to 450 reais per megawatt hour, there are by definition no higher patrons for vitality financial savings.
If the generator can promote the misplaced megawatt-hours to the miner at a value beneath the break-even level, the generator can get better income that may in any other case be zero.
That is the mechanism. Reductions create stranded worth, mining converts stranded worth into calculations, and elevated tariffs decrease {hardware} prices sufficient to slim the arbitrage window.
What’s going to occur if the paper turns into a actuality?
If Brazil’s energy era curtailment continues or widens as renewable vitality continues to construct as much as outstrip transmission capability, energy producers will face growing income strain.
Mining affords a two-way PPA construction that requires no new submissions and might be began inside days of {hardware} supply. The outdated tariffs will stay in impact till January 2028, with a 24-month grace interval for miners to check the economics of reductions whereas guaranteeing {hardware} value certainty.
Engie’s pilot framework means that different utilities and unbiased energy producers consider comparable choices. If a number of giant renewable initiatives announce colocation offers over the subsequent 12 months, Brazil will change into a significant incremental hashrate vacation spot.
This occurs not due to nationwide technique, however as a result of project-level economics are aligned.
The nation already has clear laws relating to Bitcoin, a well-established banking infrastructure for crypto firms, and no capital controls that may lock up mining income inside the nation.
Nonetheless, typically a paper fails. As transmission upgrades speed up and curtailments are diminished, the pool of pent-up vitality will shrink and electrical energy costs will rise.
If Bitcoin problem spikes and the hashrate drops beneath the $30 per petahash vary, the breakeven energy value might be beneath what most abatement contracts can ship.
If native allowing and grid interconnection processes create friction in knowledge heart building, the associated fee benefits of {hardware} change into irrelevant.
And if the outdated tariffs aren’t renewed and expire in January 2028, import value boundaries will as soon as once more exist.
| bucket | metric | worth | why is it vital |
|---|---|---|---|
| Discount scale | Wind curtailment (October 2021 to September 2025) | 32TWh | Outline the mining goal for the “stranded worth” pool |
| Impression of discount | Lack of wind energy era income (identical interval) | 6 billion reais (~$1.2 billion) | Present that discount is a matter of economics, not rounding error. |
| Popularization of renewable vitality | Wind + solar energy era ratio (2024) | twenty 4% | Greater VRE share tends to extend congestion/curtailment strain |
| Popularization of renewable vitality | Share of wind energy era + solar energy era (August 2025) | 34% | “First” milestones that point out structural modifications |
| coverage filter | Goal {hardware} | SHA256, >200TH/sec, <20 J/TH @35°C | Targets the highest ASIC class. excluding outdated rigs |
| Coverage window | 0% import obligation is legitimate till the next interval | January 31, 2028 | A time-limited “choice window” that miners can transfer by way of |
| utility sign | Engie Assu Sol plant measurement | 895MWp | It is sufficiently big to be vital. Displaying severe curiosity in turbines |
| mining income | Hash Value (February 16) | $34.05 / PH/sec/day | Anchor profitability calculation |
| rig economics | Minimal day by day income for eligible rigs | ~$6.81/day | Tie income to particular machine courses |
| rig economics | Energy consumption | 4.0kW | Convert effectivity → electrical energy invoice sensitivity |
| rig economics | day by day vitality | 96kWh/day | Make it doable to intuitively perceive the break-even level |
| break-even energy | Electrical energy break-even level | $0.071/kWh (~R$370/MWh) | Quantity that determines whether or not it’s a hub or not |
| Value actuality test | Retail enterprise electrical energy (June 2025) | R$0.657/kWh (R$657/MWh) | Exhibits why miners want wholesale/diminished costs |
| Value actuality test | wholesale spot bands (incessantly) | R$250～450/MWh | Signifies {that a} feasibility zone exists typically |
Constraints of Bitcoin miners that nobody talks about
Zero % import tariffs are vital, however they don’t clear up the funding hole.
The helpful lifetime of mining {hardware} is measured in epochs of problem, not many years. Brazil’s value of capital is larger than within the US or Europe, limiting native banks’ urge for food for crypto-native credit score.
Miners scaling up in Brazil will want both dollar-denominated offshore financing or fairness constructions that may take in illiquidity.
One other constraint is operational. Mining in renewable vitality energy crops works when curtailment is predictable or when the contract construction permits for interruptible hundreds.
Nonetheless, if the cuts change into sporadic or the grid dynamics change from second to second, the uptime will lower and the efficient hash value will lower.
Engie’s remark that “implementation will take years” means that the corporate understands that bolt-on mining infrastructure requires engineering past simply PPA signing.
What Brazil is definitely betting on
Brazil did not get up and resolve to change into a mining heart. It created focused value reductions in {hardware} that would monetize structural grid issues, and the nationwide energy firm publicly examined this narrative on the identical day.
The stakes are narrower than they seem. Can miners take in sufficient curtailed vitality to enhance generator economics with out destabilizing the grid or creating new political dangers?
If the reply is sure, Brazil will get hold of incremental hashrate with out instantly subsidizing it. Miners pay for electrical energy, turbines get better misplaced income, and tariff elimination eliminates friction.
If the reply is not any, the decision will expire in January 2028 and the experiment will finish. In any case, insurance policies have deadlines, financial circumstances are clear, and commitments are reversible.
But when the basics match and Brazil’s circumstances match, the choice has worth.
Energy financial savings are rising, {hardware} prices are falling, and main energy producers are publicly pricing their trade-offs.
This window is open till January 2028. What occurs subsequent depends upon whether or not sufficient miners discover the opening earlier than the window closes.
