He electrical fraud linked to the production of marijuana that he has detected in Spain the company Endesa throughout 2022 is equivalent to the annual consumption of a city as Seville. And the 80% of all that fraud takes place in Cataloniathe territory most affected by the cannabis boom, and whose expansion began in 2015 began to grow “exponentially” from 2018, according to data from the aforementioned electricity company.
The electricity company Endesa carries out five interventions every day against cannabis plantations
In 2018, electricity fraud in Catalonia was compared to the annual consumption of a city like Girona. Currently, to complete this simile, Girona must also be added to the cities of Lleida, tarragona and Sabadell. In Catalonia, marijuana plants that grow clandestinely in indoor crops claim as much electricity as almost 600,000 inhabitants.
80% of all fraud detected by Endesa in Spain is registered in Catalonia
Endesa technicians attend every intervention that the police forces carry out against one of these plantations. They accompany both agents of the Mossos d’Esquadraof the National Police and of the Civil Guard. They are, therefore, a reliable measure of the growth of your actions. They currently carry out more than 5 every day. More than ever.
Portugal, France or Italy punish electricity fraud with prison sentences
Almost all of the ‘indoor’ marijuana plantations are illegally connected to the electricity grid. Paying the bill is not an option for traffickers given the demand for the 600 or 1,000 watt bulbs they install to illuminate each square meter –and, to a lesser extent, also for air conditioning devices for refrigeration and extraction devices for ventilation– would mean facing every month, in an average plantation such as those that grow without control in Catalonia, a cost of more than 60,000 euros.
Unlike Andalusiawhere the nurseries tend to be smaller, sophisticated facilities proliferate in the Catalan territory, in the hands of criminal organizations, which occupy or rent houses in urbanizations or even industrial ships whole. The use of these sodium bulbs replaces sunlight and allows traffickers – who have paid electricians in charge of the facilities – to collect up to four crops of buds each year that, later, sold by europewhere each gram multiplies its value.
the commissioner Ramon Chaconin charge of the General Commissioner for Criminal Investigation (CGIC) of the Mossos, recently summarized the seriousness of the phenomenon in the following paradigm: Spain, and especially Catalonia, has become a country that exports marijuana and that matter criminal organizations from the rest of the planet, he explained. Are mafiasin internal competition for control of the territory, know that the business lies in producing marijuana in Catalonia and exporting it to the rest of the continent.
For this reason, Endesa sources emphasize, before the plantations were next to the AP-7 and now, after saturating this axis, they abound next to the C-25 and they are even detected next to the natural border of the Pyrenees, in towns like Puigcerdà or Llívia, or in places like Lleida.
more lax laws
The existence of electricity fraud associated with the cannabis boom does not only harm a company like Endesa, underlines one of its lawyers, Enric Moreraalso does it to the rest of the clients who do pay the invoice but must bear the power outages that cause manipulations in the network or its overload caused by traffickers. Or that an accident occurs that causes a fire –something that has already happened– or that a neighbor ends up being electrocuted due to the traps that are placed connected to the network to defend against drug assaults –attacks between gangs of traffickers with the purpose of stealing the merchandise–.
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For Endesa, a fundamental cause of the problem that Catalonia is suffering, and which has serious consequences for safety, health and the economy, is a more lax legal framework than in other European countries. More lenient not only in the penalties that traffickers receive for producing and selling marijuana –considered a soft drug despite the fact that more and more concentrations of THC, its active ingredient, are more dangerous to health–, but also for drug fraud. electricity. In the rest of the continent, defrauding electricity is a crime associated with prison sentences. In countries such as Portugal, France or Italy, the respective laws contemplate severe penalties for this crime.
“They know that electricity fraud here does not mean going to jail,” asserted Morera, who added that Endesa has asked an external law firm to draft a proposal for tightening of laws. This, he details, would mean raising the penalties for fraud of more than 400 euros to 18 months and, if it is shown that this is related to a criminal organization or marijuana trafficking, that it be from 1 to 3 years.