Any guesses on how much electricity it takes to make the power co. suspicious?

I hope everyone's grows are going well!

I am curious for good reason. I am pushing 2400 Watts at this point. 2000 watts of light and 400 watts of other stuff. I am in a place where they have definitely used that to go after people before.

Does anyone have any ideas about this? I would really appreciate any constructive input. Thx for looking!

2400 hundred watts won't make anyone wonder. I don't think 20amps is going to get you busted unless you live in a shed.

Not to mention I assume that for half the day your lights are off? It amounts to not a lot. I've seen 10kwatts in lights going and nobody cared.

That's only a couple of space heaters worth of wattage keeping your granny warm.

Thanks for the input. I'm not worried about the 2400 Watts, I'm wondering how high I can go. I have room for 8000 watts. Wish I would have thought to specify that in the first post.

I've seen 10k in lights and was nervous but nothing ever came of it. I dunno what climate you are at, but where I am 8k is nothing. Hot tub? Furnace? AC?
You r good.
Imo

Put out a sign that says "Commercial Welder" and a phone number
My pool, hot tub, A/c , welder ...you should be fine
Usually its loose lips not power company inquiries that get people popped

What they all said.

Pay your bill.
Don't steal electricity.
The Electric Company wants your money.

I know 12k can get you attention. Seen it happen to a buddy whos serving 20 years.

Also, if a poco employee checks the meter and smells weed, then reports it, and if a bust happens the employee gets a reward. The guy that narced on my buddy got 10k according to the discovery papers.

If you have an old spinny power meter and they change it to a digital one they are watching. Those digital meters can see the 12/12 cycle. After a few weeks of that the police will arrive.

It all just depends, if that is the only security concern you have your good. They can’t get a warrant solely based on high wattage on a set schedule. As you could be growing other plants or any number of other things. Make sure your house doesn’t smell outside don’t care how much it cost ya, and hope that whoever you tell keeps there mouth shut. Out of any worry you should have it is other people that know what your doing. The only times I’ve ever been in a box was because I trusted someone I shouldn’t have. Go the extra mile to make sure your build is secure, NO SMELL OUTSIDE, no vent placement that will be melting snow or any other security breach of that sort.

Then the only thing you have to worry about is the people that know. Which let me tell ya the ones you thought were trust worthy most likely aren’t. Also never never mess with people who do drugs, as they can never be trusted 100%.

Oh and pay your bills, don’t get into domestic disputes or break other laws and make sure you don’t have fire hazards. The only time I’ve heard of any kind of bust for growing that didn’t have a snitch was because the cops came for other reasons.

I say this all depends where your growing, im in illinois where its a misdemeanor, and I'm fairly confident that after last year my UPS, FedEx, mailman, and power meter reader all know. In fact they changed it to a digital last year while it was just stankin right where they change the meter.

I grossly underestimated how ineffective a carbon scrubber is when humidity is around 90% outside, which is to say it cut about 60% of the smell down.

Still no knocks or kicks, I guess they could have told someone. But since the governor's talking about legalization this year and they have already been talking about expunging the records of people arrested for marijuana related offenses.
Well, Maybe they don't want to be assholes and start something new that's just going to get dropped anyway.

One of my HS buddies is a cop on a swat team not far away from me and he said they refuse to do warrants for just marijuana now, not worth the liabilities.

But in Texas, alabama, the virginias, tennesee...I wouldn't mess w those state's, if tobacco or cotton is a cash crop where you wanting to grow, I assure you the authorities are not going to like you.

As long as you pay your bill your fine

NGA said:

As long as you pay your bill your fine

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This.

I have a heater running at 1500w in my office right now as I type this. My PC, speakers, and 3 monitors take up ~900w by itself. I've had $800-$900 electric bills from running ~7500w of grow equipment in my shed a couple years back. The bill got paid so no one really gave a damn.

Think about it from the electric company's perspective, at the end of the day they are a business and not many people use $500+ in electricity. If you use more of their product than others do and pay your bill on time then they won't be asking questions.

Renfro said:

Also, if a poco employee checks the meter and smells weed, then reports it, and if a bust happens the employee gets a reward. The guy that narced on my buddy got 10k according to the discovery papers.

If you have an old spinny power meter and they change it to a digital one they are watching. Those digital meters can see the 12/12 cycle. After a few weeks of that the police will arrive.

Click to expand...

haha I got a smart meter 5 yrs ago no popo here just a cheaper bill.

Not the electric company to worry about, helicopters are the issue

Hugo Phurst said:

What they all said.

Pay your bill.
Don't steal electricity.
The Electric Company wants your money.

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^^^^this
Power Co only gets involved if you don't pay, try to steal power or consume enough power to overload your houses service drop. If the house was built with a 150-200 amp service, power co isn't even going to notice-just pay your bill and no worries.

Heat signature is what they go off if they really want to find large scale grow ops My Brother was an Air Traffic Controller and pilot and the PoPo have military grade tech, they say it's for thermal tracking suspects , people who are lost ect but they use it to track grow ops too

Heathen Raider said:

Heat signature is what they go off if they really want to find large scale grow ops My Brother was an Air Traffic Controller and pilot and the PoPo have military grade tech, they say it's for thermal tracking suspects , people who are lost ect but they use it to track grow ops too

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100% i get helis doin low hover bys every 3 months or so

VillageAnt said:

Thanks for the input. I'm not worried about the 2400 Watts, I'm wondering how high I can go. I have room for 8000 watts. Wish I would have thought to specify that in the first post.

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no one else said it, but if you go high enough the IRS does a routine check. happens whenever you spend idk whatever it is 10-17k .

Monster_of_Au said:

no one else said it, but if you go high enough the IRS does a routine check. happens whenever you spend idk whatever it is 10-17k .

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The law is $10k, or smaller amounts equaling 10k or greater. But flashing a lot of cash is dangerous, I’d not worry about the cops but the other predators out there.