Sustainable Bitcoin miner Iris Energy (NASDAQ: IREN) has successfully energized the first 40 megawatts (MW) of its latest data center expansion in Childress, Texas. This initial phase brings an additional 1.6 exahashes per second (EH/s) of mining capacity online, marking a significant step in the company’s ongoing growth strategy within the United States.

The energization is part of a larger 100MW development at the Childress site. With this first phase complete, the site’s total operating capacity now stands at 140MW. The new infrastructure is already powering the latest generation of ASIC miners, contributing directly to the company’s increased operational hashrate, which now totals 11.6 EH/s across all its facilities.

This expansion underscores a key trend in the capital-intensive crypto mining industry: building versatile, large-scale infrastructure. Iris Energy has explicitly designed its data centers to be flexible, capable of supporting not only Bitcoin mining but also the surging demand for high-performance computing (HPC) and Artificial Intelligence workloads. By securing massive power agreements and building robust data centers, companies like IREN are positioning their assets to capture value from multiple high-growth technology sectors.

For the crypto mining hardware market, this development is a strong bullish signal. Major expansions from publicly traded companies like Iris Energy translate directly into large-volume orders for the latest and most efficient ASIC miners. As the industry continues to professionalize and scale, the demand for cutting-edge hardware remains robust, driven by miners seeking to maximize their hashrate and operational efficiency. The full 100MW expansion at Childress is projected to be completed in the coming months, further cementing Texas’s role as a global hub for cryptocurrency mining.