International Journal of Scientific Research and Engineering Development

Behind-the-meter Bitcoin mining is often described either as a climate liability or as a curtailment sink. Neither framing is complete because both ignore the fixed-price power purchase agreements (PPAs) that make the arrangement financeable. Using the publicly filed Cipher Mining–Luminant PPA (SEC Exhibit 10.35, up to 210 MW at Odessa, TX) as an empirical anchor and a stochastic residual-demand model in which capacities (K_R, K_F, K_M) are jointly optimized, this paper isolates the conditions under which a flexible computing load (FCL) governed by a fixed-price PPA lowers system carbon. We prove a distribution-free profit and reliability result (Proposition 1), a capacity-substitution channel K_R* ≥ K_R° (Lemma 1), and a signed carbon decomposition (Equation 17) whose sign depends on the balance between fossil crowd-in and renewable expansion. We verify all claims across eight residual-demand distributions and 40,000-sample Monte Carlo experiments, extend the analysis to a Wasserstein distributionally robust variant, and calibrate the framework to the Cipher–Luminant contract. The contribution is four-fold: (i) a tractable joint contract–capacity model; (ii) a signed comparative-statics classification; (iii) a robust-carbon certificate along a likelihood-ratio path; and (iv) a calibrated bridge from the SEC-filed PPA to policy design in ERCOT and comparable RTOs.

Shreyas Kondapuram, "Flexible Computing Loads, Power Purchase Agreements, and Carbon: A Contract-Theoretic Analysis of Bitcoin Mining as Grid-Adjacent Demand Response" International Journal of Scientific Research and Engineering Development, V9(4): Page(747-750) July-August 2026. ISSN: 2581-7175. www.ijsred.com. Published by Scientific and Academic Research Publishing.