I keep reef aquariums and have a green thumb, and after doing some research built a high powered LED light for my reef tank. My corals love it, and replaced a 150watt Metal halide for a light source that uses 1/10 the power.
The reason that LEDs work so well for this, as I understand it, is because white LEDs are primarily blue in nature, and the blue spectra sits almost right on top on one of the two main chlorophyll absorption lines.
So, I extrapolate if this works for light sucking marine corals, this should work for terrestrial plants as well. Some debate about blue/red being more advantageous for vegetative growth, but big deal.
What struck me is the lack of anybody really testing this in scale, except NASA, that seems commited to using solid state lighting for plant growth on space missions. Insert big application gap before you run into dope growers using under-powered Chinese LED lights a fraction as bright as mine, and I'm obviously not interested in that.
So, rather than turn my house into a greenhouse, I thought about approaching some local greehouses/nurseries that use metal haldies and see if they want to experiment. I'm just interested in the science behind this and will have to likely do some convincing since I'm not selling them anything. Since when is finding a way to do something practical such as growing food that requires a fraction the power over the prior method a bad thing?
However, I don't have enough formal knowledge to conclude that the reason terrestrial plants aren't using solid state lighting is because (a) there's some reason it doesn't work well, or (b) it's yet another example of people being too stubborn to change to better technology.
A friend suggested I try a local college and see if they have an agriculture dept interested in doing some larger scale testing, but it seems a bit strange and I need some constructive criticism.
The reason that LEDs work so well for this, as I understand it, is because white LEDs are primarily blue in nature, and the blue spectra sits almost right on top on one of the two main chlorophyll absorption lines.
So, I extrapolate if this works for light sucking marine corals, this should work for terrestrial plants as well. Some debate about blue/red being more advantageous for vegetative growth, but big deal.
What struck me is the lack of anybody really testing this in scale, except NASA, that seems commited to using solid state lighting for plant growth on space missions. Insert big application gap before you run into dope growers using under-powered Chinese LED lights a fraction as bright as mine, and I'm obviously not interested in that.
So, rather than turn my house into a greenhouse, I thought about approaching some local greehouses/nurseries that use metal haldies and see if they want to experiment. I'm just interested in the science behind this and will have to likely do some convincing since I'm not selling them anything. Since when is finding a way to do something practical such as growing food that requires a fraction the power over the prior method a bad thing?
However, I don't have enough formal knowledge to conclude that the reason terrestrial plants aren't using solid state lighting is because (a) there's some reason it doesn't work well, or (b) it's yet another example of people being too stubborn to change to better technology.
A friend suggested I try a local college and see if they have an agriculture dept interested in doing some larger scale testing, but it seems a bit strange and I need some constructive criticism.
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