Another way to look at LED's.

So I'm sitting here on a Saturday morning, rocking my son (Ozzy, some Maiden, and a twitch of Skinny Puppy makes a good blend for a 2 month old), watching the AI Sols come up on my reef, when something occurred to me.

We're a fairly small hobby with not much literature and almost no industrial interest. Between you potheads out there though, and industrial horticulture, there is a huge and thriving interest in growing photosynthetic organisms successfully and efficiently.

I did a little research, very little, and I'll do a lot more. I reason though, that while the two types of organism are quite different, the nature of their conversion of light to energy and food is quite similar. I think then it is fair to ask the question, how do LED's do relative to other light sources for commercial horticulture?

So far, the answer seems to be better than fluorescent lighting. I've found nothing on a comparison with halides.

PLANT GROWTH UNDER WHITE LEDS COMPARED WITH UNDER FLUORESCENT LAMPS

I wonder what else we could learn about this debate at least?

 

Interesting idea. Led's are some intense light. for how small they are. This post reminded me of when I was looking to buy my led's. I would search led's on craigslist and get all sorts of grow kit setups for "vegetables". hahah yeah right. you send them and e-mail saying your interested and you get an email back from tokinONpurp420@yahoo.com ha

 

Lol "veggies".

That's interesting!

 

The heat temperature of growing lights is often much lower than those above our tanks. They may promote photosynthesis better, but things would not look as good in our tanks. They are often a more yellow light compared to the blues most of us prefer over our tanks. Most of use try to achieve a balance of looks and growth.
As for how the lights compare, you can compare efficiency, LEDs are more energy efficient than halides, however halides are more effective at delivering their light, however only slightly better, than LEDs.

Which one will grow better? A photon of light is a photon of light, regardless of the source. So in theory, you could grow the same with either source. It just may require more money to do so one over the other.