Bitcoin miners are facing a new competitor for cheap power as AI company Anthropic signs a massive deal with Google and Broadcom to build out its next-generation TPU capacity starting in 2027. This partnership marks a significant shift in the energy landscape, as AI now represents one of the largest sources of U.S. power demand.
The rapid expansion of AI infrastructure is emerging as a direct competitor to bitcoin mining for scarce resources like cheap electricity, land, and grid connections. Major bitcoin miners are increasingly shifting towards hosting AI workloads, positioning themselves as power and data-center infrastructure providers that also mine bitcoin.
Anthropic’s deal with Google and Broadcom is its largest to date, committing the company to “multiple gigawatts” of TPU compute capacity starting in 2027. This move shows how quickly AI is becoming a peer-level competitor for the same energy infrastructure that miners depend on.
The scale of AI compute demand is now competing directly with bitcoin mining for the same scarce resources, drawing roughly 13-25 gigawatts of continuous power globally. Anthropic’s securing multiple gigawatts from a single deal demonstrates just how quickly AI is becoming a rival for cheap power.
OpenAI, another major player, is building across an even wider infrastructure portfolio spanning five cloud providers and four chip platforms. The aggregate AI compute buildout now represents one of the largest sources of new electricity demand in the United States, arriving at the same moment bitcoin miners are deciding whether to mine or rent their infrastructure to AI companies.
A key factor driving this shift is the fluctuating revenue numbers for bitcoin mining. At $69,000 per bitcoin with difficulty at all-time highs and energy costs rising, renting power to AI companies often pays better than running a gigawatt of capacity as a miner. This trend suggests that miners who survive the current cycle may look less like energy companies producing bitcoin and more like infrastructure providers that happen to mine on the side.
While bitcoin mining is not dying, its future will likely involve a shift towards hosting AI workloads, positioning themselves as power and data-center infrastructure providers that also mine bitcoin. The network’s hashrate continues to hit record levels above 1 zetahash per second, but miners must adapt to this changing landscape to remain competitive.
Source: https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2026/04/07/bitcoin-miners-face-a-new-rival-for-cheap-power-as-anthropic-signs-multi-gigawatt-compute-deal