Ethiopia has reduced electricity supplied to Bitcoin miners to 23% of contracted levels after reservoir inflows fell 20% amid intensified El Niño-driven dry conditions. Ethiopian Electric Power CEO Ashebir Balcha said deliveries were cut in stages from 75% to 50% and then 23% to prioritize households and manufacturers. EEP will reassess reservoir and electricity conditions in October; further mining cuts and restrictions on electricity exports to neighboring countries remain possible. Miners consumed almost one-third of Ethiopia’s electricity and generated 35% of EEP’s revenue during the previous fiscal year. The restrictions arrive as Bitcoin mining economics weaken following the April 2024 halving, which reduced the block subsidy from 6.25 BTC to 3.125 BTC. Economist and The Bitcoin Standard author Saifedean Ammous said global mining electricity use and capital expenditure may have peaked between 2024 and 2025, a testable hypothesis that could be invalidated by substantially higher transaction fees or a sustained recovery in electricity consumption. Bitcoin has fallen more than 35% over the past 12 months, while miners are increasingly considering AI and high-performance computing as alternative uses for their power agreements and infrastructure.