Finding cannabis plantations in the mountains isn't easy, but in addition to the water reservoirs—which allow them to tighten the perimeter—the Mossos d'Esquadra have a great ally: the local residents. Unlike in other areas, where officers have much more difficulty finding actively cooperating citizens, informants work very well in the mountains. Farmers, shepherds, hunters, rural agents, or simply local residents already have the contact information of the police officer in charge and alert them to any unusual movement. "A few weeks ago, a resident of a mountain village alerted us that she heard a brushcutter that didn't belong to anyone in the village," explains Jaume Carbó, the Mossos d'Esquadra corporal responsible for the Rural Environment of Alt Camp and Head of the Office of Relations with the Community. Since this is the time of year when traffickers clear the mountains to plant crops, the officers gave maximum credibility to the informant's testimony and responded immediately. Guided by the roar of the brush cutter's engine, they managed to find the hiding place.

In order for marijuana to grow indoors, lights, heaters, fans and other devices that need electricity to work are needed. And they need a lot of it. A marijuana greenhouse can consume the same amount of electricity as 80 large apartments, each measuring around 100 m2. In Catalonia, plantations in homes that used the same amount of electricity as an entire hospital have been dismantled. In total, according to the data published by Endesa on Tuesday, last year the cannabis plantations detected in the country defrauded an amount of electricity equivalent to the consumption of Canovelles, a town of 17,000 inhabitants. That's 162 gigabytes per hour, 26% of the electricity defrauded in Catalonia.

The marijuana business is spreading in Catalonia and is sparking fraudulent energy consumption. In the last four years, the number of cases of electricity fraud linked to illegal marijuana plantations have doubled, according to Endesa's calculations. In 2021 the company closed the year with 684 reports linked to this illicit activity in residential buildings, twice as many as in 2018. This means almost two cannabis plantations using stolen electricity are discovered every day.