40% of US corn acreage is used for something like 10% of gasoline. This is an unfathomable amount of land. Solar yields 20x the amount of energy per acre. On top of that many are finding efficiencies of colocating solar with agricultural activities (agrivoltaics). And there's also replacing agricultural activities on marginal or water stressed land.
Conclusion, land isn't really a constraint in the US.
> I think the likely reason is they have signed a non disparagement agreement and have no avenue to publicly criticize
That was litigated during Trump's first term and held to be not enforceable. That was the case brought by one of his reality show contestants that he appointed to something (the exact details are too trivial to care about).
Universities typically only spend about 5% of their endowments per year, since it has to last forever. And much of it comes with restrictions on what it can be spent on, those come from the donors wishes. So money in the endowment that's for the theater department or to support an econ professorship can't be repurposed to support federal funds that supported cancer research.
Yeah they try to make them perpetual by only spending less than their growth each year but with 52 billion you could afford to draw down a billion or two (2.6 billion would be 5%) and that would fund research for years.
> Of course big corp media like NYT would report on injustices in red states, especially Texas.
NYT in particular reports all the time about injustices in blue states. Its done a string of stories on the horrific stories on Rykers Island prison. There's also been extensive coverage of prison conditions in California.
Hopefully there's an expiration date on the supply contract. It would be too bad if the mining cramped the town's ability to use electricity as it (hopefully) increases usage.
Later in the article it says they already plan to leave, as the hydro plant will be connected to the broader grid and make more money selling into the grid.
Doesn't seem like the best donation of $3M to build the plant in the first place, barely connecting anyone and most of the energy going to a for-profit bitcoin miner. $3M is a lot of solar panels + diesel generators.
The article makes it sound like there isn't a contracted price, but that low cost of power is a temporary situation that will only last until the hydro plant can connect to the national grid.
This article from 2 days ago says they have a test rig that is drilling outside. They don't say exactly how deep they have drilled but mentions they have another site where they will attempt to drill up to 100 feet.
So sounds like they are at the very beginning of piloting. I'm not going to listen to an hour podcast to see if it is claiming anything different, if you have a text source I'd be interested.
Conclusion, land isn't really a constraint in the US.
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