I was listening to a podcast and they were talking about how people used to hit licks by pointing infrared cameras at houses. They were saying the grow houses would light the fuck up. Especially the power cables going to that house. They were saying its pretty easy to tell.
This is just me being curious as I am pretty sure I have nothing to worry about with my small set up. I have two LEDS rated at 105 watts but equivalent to a thousand watts each. I’m curious though, since leds take drastically less power, is this even a worry anymore?
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210 Watts from the plug is not likely to trigger any concern.
Some of the techniques today include power usage reporting to the local dotGov and/or usage patterns. We have had a certain amount of interest from our town for power usage but that was mainly due to running servers. We utilize probably about double of our neighbors. A local assessor was particularly interested in the servers we had running, as though it was the main item of interest. Exclaimed ‘oh’ when she saw them.
But, yeah, FLIR can certainly show hotspots if they are onto something though you’d be talking high power usage and lots of heat. 200 Watts is minimal.
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I would agree with Loki. Thermal imagers are used to find grow setups, just doubt it would be a big deal for you.
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Yea I figured I have nothing to worry about, but this was news to me. So the ir is picking up the heat from the energy lines or the heat from the lightS?
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210w is less heat than your coffee maker creates and less power than it uses. That “watt equivalent” is marketing nonsense. They’re talking about big grows with multiple 1000w hps taking up whole rooms. The guy with one or two smaller lights for a personal grow had little to worry about then and has nothing to worry about now(as far as IR surveillance goes) 210w is less power than a Videogame console. Even if your non legal nobody will notice it.
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This ^
You’d need at least 2000 actual watts to even begin worrying about this. If you’re growing for just yourself, no need to worry.
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I use around 4x as much power as my neighbors l, only thing the electric company has done is send a notice saying rates over 1000kwh are increasing %15 which does suck cause I use around 4000kwh 
I’m not super worried though cause weeds sort of decriminalized here. Up to 10lbs of flower and 12 plants is a max of 30days in jail and $1000 fine.
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200 watts is nothing. My tv runs 200w.
Don’t worry you’ll be fine.
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A space heater uses about as much wattage per hour as my entire flower room with 5 300w LEDs… which is half my basement. It’s not a small basement, either. No one has the time or inclination to be chasing down everyone who’s still using a space heater, I would think; as for a 200w LED, yeah, it’s nothing. In theory, IR could pick up hotspots either in the power lines or the grow room, but unless you’re really chasing down things to be paranoid about I don’t recommend doing anything about it other than basic common sense. Don’t leave bright lights shining out the windows at all hours, don’t let the smell get out, and don’t tell anyone unless they absolutely need to know. Loose lips sink ships.
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I was just going to make a similar comment about a space heater. A space heater alone can make any room of the house look like a grow room if it kicks out enough heat.
I guess what I’m asking is if you were to do an led grow, let’s say, an entire two story house. If you were to use leds,which is way less power, would people be able to use ir to come jack you?
I know my two lights is nothing to worry about, but my brain gets to thinking about hypotheticals. I’m not sure if I’m wording my question right also.
People won’t be able to use IR to ‘see’ your grow. Authorities still have to have probable cause to search the residence and I don’t believe a FLIR photo is enough ‘evidence’. I’m not a lawyer though, and rules change wildly based on where you live. One thing you have to consider is that they have to be able to prove you’re growing. There are an increasingly large number of electronic devices these days which use a large amount of electricity. For one to accuse a suspected grower, they have to know with reasonable certainty that your electric is being spent on light and not on something like say an A/C unit or something like that. You have to be in the tens of thousands of watts before people start noticing. I run a 5’x3’ tent (700w), a 4’x2’ veg tent (240w), and a small 17w clone box. Not only can I grow more than I’m able to consume, no one will ever be able to tell. My 660w main light is brighter than a summer day and even with a IR thermometer it only gets up to 145 degrees at the hottest spot. Inches away it’s room temp. This isn’t the kind of thing that’s going to ‘tip someone off’.
If you’re running 200w of LED you won’t even be producing enough to become a target. Don’t be paranoid. 
Just remember the golden rule of secrecy. “Loose lips sink ships.”
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If you see the screen from a ir cam from most grows you"ll notice things like big signitures around windows, chimneys, vents ect. What we used to do (obviously discreetly) is start taking temperature readings from outdoors. So for example on the windows, the ledges, doors or vents ect. Another thing we used to do was to completely insulate the room from inside with the thick insulation cladding used on the outside of buildings to completely trap all heat within. Very successful methods wich make it extremely hard for ir to pick up a picture of difference to other homes.
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You’d be surprised how sometimes they get away with hitting a suspected grow. Ive know them to lie a number of times that they have been tipped off from someone living close of suspicious people entering the property. I myself was busted once like this despite their being no breakin visible from outdoor and it being obvious who ever had gone in had gone in with a key.
I wonder if the power company can see the timed power draws of lights etc? My mentor told me just to pay the bill and they won’t care. Which I do, but I worry about the timed draws tipping off an electric co-op employee as to my hobby.
I doubt it, as the 12 on 12 off, or 4-6 off ect ect coincides with lifestyles of people resting and waking. Probably how a lot of heating systems are set too.
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Not 100% sure about this tip, but I’ve been told if you put a mylar emergency blanket above your entire setup it ‘hides’ all the heat underneath.
@DougDawson - That cop has authority to check out that building because it’s abandoned. He wouldn’t be able to do all of that if the residence was lived in(had a tenant). They even mention in the video that the residence should have had no heat pattern as it was abandoned. They could not pull that stuff on a lived in family home. There’s too many variables and the most important thing is… the homeowners have rights. When you’re lookin at an abandoned building, it’s too easy. Whoever was setup in that location was ready to let everything go anyways… that’s why it was in an abandoned building.
@NIGHTMARE - If someone was able to get into your residence with a key then it the police have first hand witnesses. It sounds like a different situation than a homeowner growing. To me it sounds like you were growing in an apartment (how else would someone random have a key to your place??). If that’s the case then legally the police had all the authority because you were just a tenant and not an owner. As an owner you have a lot more rights for that kind of thing. These things become legal matters very quickly and there are just too many different rules in different parts of the world.
@Vigor - I highly doubt it. How can a power company distinguish between a 1200w A/C unit running for 12+ hours a day vs a 660w LED running 12 hours a day? Unless they have some way of tracking your usage by room, there’s no way they can tell what electric goes to what appliance. All the power company knows is how much electricity you use. You have to realize too that every place is short handed. Companies don’t have time to see what the electric is being used on, they don’t care. All they care is that you use power and pay your bill.
@ColeLennon - That’s EXACTLY the kind of thing which sets the cops off. If it’s that dang obvious do you think the judge has a hard time issuing the search warrant? Before they knock on the door they already know what’s up. It’s our job as hobby growers to make everything discreet. This is not discreet. 
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Scanning from the sidewalk is simple enough and you would be surprised how easily a cop can come up with justification.
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