Dennis Porter, of Satoshi Action Fund. Photo illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios. Photo: Mark Felix/Bloomberg via Getty Images
A new advocate for bitcoin miners, Satoshi Action Fund, believes that securing the oldest cryptocurrency could be an effective way to finance a longstanding environmental problem in the United States: orphaned gas wells.
Why it matters: The Environmental Defense Fund released a map in 2021 of 81,000 wells with no owner of record. While there are federal funds available to aid in sealing these wells, it’s still a daunting task.
- Dennis Porter, founder of the organization, is pushing policy for bitcoin miners to step in, use the last remaining gas to mine, and then seal the well and move on.
Driving the news: On Wednesday, the organization made its first presentation in the halls of the U.S. Congress, in a Senate briefing room, to 30 to 40 people from around 10…