Reabold Resources, an investment firm focused on developing European gas projects, said it is considering building a gas-powered Bitcoin Mining station in northern England.
The London-based company is exploring the potential of deploying a small power plant as a pilot for future data center development, which is “vital to the future UK economy”, it said in a statement on Monday.
Bitcoin production from the company’s West Newton well site will be used to demonstrate the ability to use natural gas to fuel data center developments, the company said. The news comes after The Daily Telegraph published an article criticizing the plan, which comes as the country faces potential gas shortages due to a war between Iran, the United States and Israel.
A British government statement in late March said concerns about potential gas shortages were unfounded and said gas supplies would not be affected.
“Only around 1% of UK gas supplies will come from Qatar in 2025. We have no reason to expect the situation to be significantly different in 2026,” it said.
The Telegraph article stated that Reabold’s West Newton gas field is so large that it could theoretically power the production of 50,000 Bitcoin tokens.
“Private gas supply means we can operate a data center to mine Bitcoin relatively cheaply,” said Sachin Oza, co-chief executive of Reabold Resources, which has a drilling license from the Environment Agency.
“Initially, this will help fund further development of the gas field and prove the concept – meaning it could be a precursor to larger data centres.”
However, the company said “significant onshore gas resources at the West Newton site in Yorkshire have been and will continue to be developed in the interests of UK energy security, which is particularly important at a time of significant geopolitical uncertainty.”
Reabold plans to expand Bitcoin mining operations into data centers at a time when Bitcoin mining is undergoing a transformation with many companies turning to high-performance computing and powering the artificial intelligence industry.
