Fluorescent Lights - An Overview
Some people who grow medical marijuana don’t even realize that you can use fluorescent T5 grow lights during your grow to help save energy and still get great results. Fluorescent lights, as everyone knows, run on a very low amount of energy, especially compared to HID grow lights such as Metal Halide or High Pressure Sodium grow light systems. These T5 fluorescent also operate much cooler than HID lights to help keep your growing climate at a favorable temperature for your flourishing medical marijuana plants.
Most medical marijuana growers that use T5 lighting systems, use them during the cloning and/or vegetative stage of growth. This is because the plant needs much less light energy during these phases of growth. A fluorescent T5 grow light system can offer the amount of light needed to these plants while using much lower energy. It is a little hard to compare a fluorescent light fixture to an HID because they are such different lighting systems, however it is easy to compare the output you get from using either one and the energy used to get there. Most 4’ T5 light bulbs are rated at 54 watts. The most popular T5 grow light system is the 4’, 4 light ballast. So using 4 lights, you are looking at using approximately 220 watts to give light to a 2’x4’ area. If you were to use an HID light for the same area, most growers would decide to use a 400W MH light. This system would obviously use at least 400 watts, if not more and will produce much more heat. This increased energy use adds up on the energy bill!
To help you understand why the vegetative or cloning phases are the best times to use a fluorescent light I have included the maximum light requirements for medical marijuana plants in these different phases (via Jorge Cervantes):
| Growth Stage | Foot-Candles | Lux | Hrs. of Light |
| Clone | 375 | 4000 | 16-24 |
| Vegetative | 2500 | 27000 | 18 |
| Flowering | 10000 | 107500 | 12 |
You can see by the illustration that flowering plants need a drastically increased amount of light to flourish. The much lower amount of light needed for the vegetative phase can most of the time be met with a T5 grow light system. Start saving energy today and switch to T5 fluorescent lighting ASAP.
Do Flourescent Lights Really Work to Grow Plants?
Flourescent lights have been around for ages and most of us are very familiar with the light these flourescents give off. You may have also heard along the way that these flourescent light systems can actually be used to grow plants. There is a longstanding myth that these lights are only for lighting up rooms and don’t have any other actual use. Most people think that flourescents are just too weak, or they don’t give off the right spectrum of light to grow plants. Others may think that you need a very specific type of grow light to grow anything under a light indoors. This myth is in fact false. Flourescent lights work very well to grow plants as long as they are used in the right way.
This myth most likely arose due to the low heat that flourescent lights give off. Most people think of the sun when they think about growing plants. The sun gives off much more than just light (heat energy) which we can feel every day! You certainly can’t warm a room with a flourescent light and most flourescents run at such a low temperature that you can’t even feel the heat coming off the bulbs any farther than a few inches away. However, just because these lights don’t give off a bunch of heat doesn’t mean they don’t give off the right kind of energy to grow plants.
In fact many indoor growers use flourescent lighting in their grow rooms as a way to lower energy costs and manage heat that most high intensity discharge grow light systems give off. Most often growers use T5 flourescent lights. This particular type of light works well with indoor grow light systems because of the smaller size and the amount of light energy that is emitted. Growers will most often use their flourescent grow light systems during cloning phases of growth and many times during the vegetative phase of the plant. The plant doesn’t need nearly as much energy when it isn’t flowering so the flourescent lights work just fine in these earlier stages to get the plant the light energy it needs to thrive and flourish.
Whether you ever believe the myth about flourescent lights being used in a grow light system or not, you should now have a clear understanding that yes, these flourescent light systems can be used to grow plants indoors.
This myth most likely arose due to the low heat that flourescent lights give off. Most people think of the sun when they think about growing plants. The sun gives off much more than just light (heat energy) which we can feel every day! You certainly can’t warm a room with a flourescent light and most flourescents run at such a low temperature that you can’t even feel the heat coming off the bulbs any farther than a few inches away. However, just because these lights don’t give off a bunch of heat doesn’t mean they don’t give off the right kind of energy to grow plants.
In fact many indoor growers use flourescent lighting in their grow rooms as a way to lower energy costs and manage heat that most high intensity discharge grow light systems give off. Most often growers use T5 flourescent lights. This particular type of light works well with indoor grow light systems because of the smaller size and the amount of light energy that is emitted. Growers will most often use their flourescent grow light systems during cloning phases of growth and many times during the vegetative phase of the plant. The plant doesn’t need nearly as much energy when it isn’t flowering so the flourescent lights work just fine in these earlier stages to get the plant the light energy it needs to thrive and flourish.
Whether you ever believe the myth about flourescent lights being used in a grow light system or not, you should now have a clear understanding that yes, these flourescent light systems can be used to grow plants indoors.
