Professional and hobbyist growers alike are switching to LED grow lights for the many advantages they offer compared to traditional grow lights such as high intensity discharge (HID) and compact fluorescent. We did a Q & A session with G8LED to find out more about their line of LED grow lights.

BC- For many years, indoor growers and hobbyists used metal halide, high pressure sodium, T5 & compact luorescent lights to grow indoors. Why now would they want to switch to LEDs? How do LED vs. HID compare?

G8LED – HID systems like metal halide and high pressure sodium have been the main lighting systems used by indoor
gardeners for a couple decades. Although these systems work as indoor growing lights, they have a few shortfalls which have given the impetus to the LED grow lights industry. HID systems are inefficient by nature.

They try to emulate the sun by using a very high power consumption bulb which will emit a very bright light for the plants to conduct photosynthesis. However, it is not necessary to have such a bright light, with high Lumen count to have successful photosynthesis. In fact, most of the energy coming off from HID systems gets wasted as extra heat which then needs to be mitigated with expensive venting and air control systems. LEDs are attractive to indoor growers since they consume much less electrical power, do not require ballasts, and produce considerably less heat. This allows LEDs to be placed closer to the plant canopy than other lights. As a result of the reduction in heat, the time between watering cycles is longer.

BC- Can you tell us about wavelength and spectrum needed?
G8LED- By using LED technology, we are able to concentrate the grow light in the wavelengths that the plants need for
photosynthesis; mainly reds and blues, but some orange, yellow, violet & white as well. When you look at a Photosynthetic Action Radiation (PAR) chart, you see that the part of the visible spectrum necessary for plants to conduct photosynthesis is concentrated in the 400-450nm & 630-680nm ranges.

PAR Chart – Primary peaks in the Blues and Reds, secondary peaks in the Yellow

G8LED Grow lights have gone through many iterations of spectra formulation to achieve the optimal 8-band wavelength ratio that goes into our LED Grow Lights. G8LED has designed and optimal ratio that not only delivers the blues and reds necessary for vegetative growth and flowering, but also provides a weighted average representation of diodes for the smaller photosynthesis peaks that appear in the PAR chart.

BC- This all sounds good, but is there any proof that LEDs actually work?

G8LED –Great question! This is one of the most asked questions from our first-time customers and the answer is a definite YES! NASA has tested LED Technology to grow food in space because of the efficiency over other growing systems. Everyday there are more commercial growers who are successfully growing with LEDs and posting their results all over the internet.

As more of these grow journals and blogs permeate through the internet, more and more growers will switch to hydroponic LED Grow Lights. As with all grow lights for indoor plants, if you do not have enough light for a given grow area, your plants will not enjoy robust growth. To be sure you are successful with LED growlights, make sure to follow the manufacturer’s recommended settings for the amount of grow area a light will cover.