As
part of any year round gardening regimen,
there is a need for 
more
lighting. Even with a greenhouse with maximum sun exposure, supplemental
lighting can help plants receive and maintain growth at optimal
rates. As part of our service, we have offered plant starts to
our local customers for the last three years. We have had time
to experiment with and contemplate which forms of lighting work
best for us and allow us to still turn a profit after the electrical
bill comes in. We have worked with traditional and electronic
ballasts, as well as fluorescent and LED fixtures. Selected are
some of the "greenest" options available for propagation,
supplemental, and primary lighting needs.
Plant lighting can be simplified according to stage of growth
of the plant. Blue spectrum lighting is used for seedling propagation
and green growth while the bloom and flowering stages of growth
utilize the red spectrum of lights. This differentiation is there
no matter what type of lighting purchased. LED lights combine
blue and red lights. These lights can be customized specifically
for your intended use. High output (HO) fluorescent bulbs come
in blue(6500K) or red(300K) bulbs. HID lights can be purchased
as a metal halide (MH) for its focus on the blue spectrum for
growth, and high pressure sodium (HPS) for its focus on the red
spectrum for flowering.
The greenest and most energy efficient of these is unquestionably
the LED lighting which saves about
80% energy as compared to HID lighting. The cons of LED lighting
has been the initial purchase cost. We have seen these cost decrease
and they are now comparable to traditional systems. As LED technology
advances, the future of lighting
systems is changing. These lights offer the most efficient and
economical systems available in the lighting world and they really
work. We highly recommend these lights.
We also carry the latest in fluorescent
technology in the T5
line
of lamps. They are high output lamps which have almost
twice the lumen output as traditional fluorescent lighting along
with spectrums that are specific to the growth stage of the plants.
The blue light (6500K) is great for propagation and green growth,
while the red light (3000K) is great for the bloom phase of growth.
There are claims that T5 lighting efficiency is about 50% of traditional
HID lighting.
Lastly,
we carry electronic ballast HID lighting.
Electronic ballast save about 20% energy as compared to traditional
HID ballast lighting. Most of the saving come in the form of the
heat reduction of these systems which allows for more energy efficient
operation in that more of the lights potential is utilized. The
other benefit of these systems is that one ballast can be used
for both Metal Halide and High Pressure Sodium bulbs.
