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Alcoa Corp. is in advanced talks to sell its idled Massena East aluminum smelter site in upstate New York to NYDIG, according to Bloomberg. The proposed transaction would transfer full ownership of the hydropower-connected campus along the St. Lawrence River, where NYDIG already has a strategic stake in the existing bitcoin mining operation.
Alcoa CEO Bill Oplinger said in an April 17, 2026 interview that the company is in advanced-stage negotiations and expects the deal to close around the middle of the year, Bloomberg reported. The Massena East facility is approximately 435 MW and is connected to hydropower from the New York Power Authority via the Moses-Saunders hydroelectric dam on the St. Lawrence River.
The campus reportedly draws about 166 MW of its approved 435 MW capacity and houses roughly 54,000 bitcoin mining units across six former aluminum smelting lines. Several third-party clients, including Cleanspark, Gryphon, and Bit Digital, have since exited the site.
NYDIG invested in the site’s prior operator, Coinmint, in October 2024, enabling NYDIG to deploy its own mining rigs at the location. Massena East has operated as a bitcoin mining campus since 2018, when Alcoa signed a 10-year lease with Coinmint, which later rebranded its local operations as North Country Colocation Services.
Bitcoin miners and data center operators have targeted former aluminum smelters because the facilities were built for continuous, high-voltage industrial loads. The sites also retain dedicated substations and transmission lines, which can reduce delays associated with new grid interconnection timelines.
Alcoa idled Massena East in 2014, citing high energy costs and global competition. The property spans approximately 1,300 acres and includes the full electrical infrastructure built for industrial-scale aluminum production.
Alcoa has not disclosed financial terms for the Massena East sale. During its Q1 2026 earnings call on April 16, Oplinger described the prospective buyer as a prior partner at the site working on a data center project, consistent with Bloomberg’s identification of NYDIG as the buyer.
The sale is part of Alcoa’s plan to divest roughly 10 dormant U.S. smelter sites. Oplinger said the company has been offering these properties to data center developers and crypto miners seeking large, pre-wired industrial footprints with utility-scale grid access.
NYDIG has been expanding its physical bitcoin mining capacity. In March 2025, it agreed to acquire Crusoe Energy’s bitcoin mining business, which had more than 270 MW of operating capacity. Combined with other North American mining assets acquired in 2024, the Massena East purchase would give NYDIG direct ownership of a site it has been operating at for over a year.
The existing mining operation at Massena employs about 85 full-time workers across Massena and Plattsburgh. Expansion under NYDIG’s ownership is expected to grow that workforce, and the Town of Massena has updated local regulations to accommodate cryptocurrency and data mining operations.
Alcoa reported strong first-quarter 2026 results alongside the deal news, posting net income of $425 million and adjusted EBITDA of $595 million, driven by aluminum prices.
The Massena East sale follows a similar move by Century Aluminum, which sold its Hawesville, Kentucky smelter to Terawulf for roughly $200 million in cash and equity for digital infrastructure use.
Repurposing the Massena site for bitcoin mining would avoid new power plant construction by routing existing hydropower capacity, a factor that has drawn interest from ESG-focused operators seeking to run carbon-free digital infrastructure.
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