Why Choose LED Grow Light For Your Plants?

There are three major light source technologies: incandescence (incandescent lamp), electrical discharge (fluorescent, HID), and solid state light sources (LED, OLED). The first two are known as “legacy” technologies, and the third is considered as modern technologies. All of the three technologies have been used in horticultural lighting solutions. But by now, after tens of years of technological improvement and cost reduction, LED outperforms in every respect compared with other artificial lighting systems for crop production.

LED lighting systems can produce very high light levels (well in excess of full sunlight if desired) with much less power consumption than HPS systems. The typical LED grow lights efficacy is about 2.5-3.0 µmol/J, the comparative HPS efficacy is only about 1.5-1.7 µmol/J. This means you can get the same PPFD level with up to 50% less energy consumption which also produces 50% less of heat according to the law of thermodynamics.

So when you use LED grow lights for your indoor gardening, even at high light outputs, they can be operated in close proximity to plant tissue because they have very little radiant heat output when cooled properly. Operating close to the canopy allows most of the light produced to be intercepted by the plant, improving the use efficiency of the lighting system. Moreover, the low heat generation characteristics of LED grow lights also considerably reduce your investment in HVAC system of your growing facilities.

LEDs have a very long operating life; New LED technologies are rated as maintaining 70% of their original luminous output after 100,000 h or even more, and this is probably a conservative number as long as the devices are cooled adequately. The longer lifetime of LEDs also contributes largely to the long term cost-saving in addition to the high energy efficiency. Because of their long operational life, procurement and disposal costs for replacement bulbs is mostly eliminated along with associated labor costs. In comparison, the best HID light sources such as HPS, MH have an average life time of only 20,000 h. VANQ LED grow lights are made of LED chips from top manufacturers in this industry, such as  Osram, Samsung, Bridgelux and Epileds, etc. The expected lifetime of our LED grow lights are 10 years.

LEDs have the potential for significant cost savings over current horticultural lamp types, such as HPS. LED grow light is able to provide two times more light output for the same watt of input power of a HPS grow light. This means that you only need to pay half of the electricity bill of HPS lighting solution to get the same amount of PPF output with an LED lighting system. The unique capabilities of LEDs can also significantly reduce power use over existing lamp types through the ability to operate in close proximity to plant tissue, the ability to optimize the light spectrum for productivity, and advanced control capabilities that allow optimization of lighting patterns.

One is the ability to control the spectral output of the lighting system, something not easily done with broad spectrum sources, such as fluorescent, HPS. The spectral output of an LED lighting system can be matched to plant photoreceptors and optimized to provide maximum production without wasting energy on nonproductive wavelengths. The ability to dynamically control the spectral output can also be used to influence plant morphology. Spectra can be customized for specific crops or production protocols and the output even modified over the course of a photoperiod or growth cycle, such as sunrise and sunset simulations can be programmed. Special lighting modes might possibly even be used to enhance disease or injury visualization.

Because they are solid-state devices, LEDs are easily integrated into digital control systems. This allows complex control options not generally available with other light sources. LEDs can be continuously dimmed between zero and maximum. This feature makes it uniquely energy-efficient in different growth stages of crop which require different PPFD levels, such as the cloning stage, vegetative stage, flowering stage of cannabis cultivation.

LEDs do not contain mercury that needs to be disposed of and do not have high surface temperatures that can cause injury, making LEDs the safest horticultural lighting solution for any home, commercial growing facility, or greenhouse.