How one Tesla owner mined crypto with his car

One Tesla owner might have found more use for his electric car prized asset beyond the road, judging by his recent revelations.

A Tesla was used to mine $800 Ethereum

A CNBC report has revealed that an owner of a 2018 Tesla Model 3, Siraj Raval, successfully mined around $800 worth of Ethereum around when the value of the asset was peaking in 2021.

According to the report, Raval revealed that he was able to connect graphics processing units (GPUs) to his car’s battery. On top of that, he was running a free Bitcoin mining software on his Apple laptop which is powered by being plugged into the power socket located in his car.

Interestingly, Raval is not the only one experimenting with mining through his car. The report stated that another proud owner of a Tesla, Chris Allessi, as far back as 2018 had tried mining cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, Ethereum and even Monero through his car.

In Allessi’s case, he once plugged a Bitmain Antminer S9 into his car’s battery with the intent of mining the flagship digital asset. 

Is mining with Tesla worth it?

With the new revelation that two Tesla owners were able to mine cryptocurrencies from their cars, the next question would be how profitable is this adventure?

Crypto mining is an integral aspect of the crypto world. Miners, by running specialized software, can create new coins and also help to validate transactions on the blockchain. The industry, however, has faced some blowbacks from authorities due to the amount of energy required to mine assets.

An average 2018 Tesla Model 3 car would cost above $40,000, and by tampering with the car’s software, these users risk losing their warranty for profits of less than $1000 monthly.

Speaking on this, Allessi was quoted to have said that though mining using the Teslas can be profitable, however, it was not worth the stress.

In his words:

“Why would you want to put that kind of wear and tear on a $40,000 to $100,000 car? And right now, even though the price for Bitcoin has gone up dramatically, so has the difficulty level…In the same amount of time with the exact same equipment, I’m probably looking at $1 or $2 worth of Bitcoin.”

But Raval holds a more positive view to mining through his Tesla. According to Raval, he ensures profitability by staking his mined asset through an investment firm that guarantees him around 23% more of his investments. 

He also makes sure that he never converts his mined asset into fiat and buys used GPUs on eBay. All of these actions together helped him to earn around $400 to $800 per month in 2021.