Posted on 07/15/2015 9:23:15 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Transcend Lighting, one of the more unconventional startups accepted into Y Combinator’s latest cohort, is launching out of beta today to bring its energy-saving LED lights to indoor farmers everywhere.
Founder Brian Bennett, an optical engineer by training, invented the first Transcend prototype after his father challenged him to build some LED lights for the family farm in upstate New York.
When the lights he designed were successful, Bennett entered a business plan competition at Columbia, won some money to continue developing the idea, and was accepted into Y Combinator’s Spring 2015 class.
“Farms today, generally speaking, use high pressure sodium lights, which are the same lights as street lamps,” says Bennett. “That works, and plants grow reasonably well under them, but it wastes a lot of energy.”
Trancend’s bulbs differ from typical LED lights because they only use blue light. The company has developed a wavelength conversion system that uses phosphorous to convert blue photons, which are the most efficient type of photon, into any other color photon.
“Phosphors have been around for a long time,” says Bennett. “What we do differently is we have phosphors specifically tuned to photosynthesis, whereas everyone else tunes them to humans so that lights seem brighter.”
By switching to Transcend’s lights, farmers have been able to reduce their energy consumption by up to 70 percent, Bennett tells me.
Believe it or not, marijuana is not the only plant grown indoors or hydroponically. Bennett says that half of Transcend’s early customers are marijuana growers, but the other half include lettuce, tomato and pepper farmers primarily on the East Coast.
As drought conditions worsen, indoor farming presents an appealing alternative for some farmers because growing hydroponically only requires 10 percent of the water consumed by outdoor farming, according to Bennett.
And by growing indoors, farmers can control the whole environment — the temperature, the humidity, the CO2 levels, the light levels — which means they can grow year-round.
“The indoor growing business is a multi-billion dollar business, and it’s booming right now especially with more technology,” Brian says. “With products like ours that reduce energy consumption significantly, it can be much more profitable to grow indoors.”
Transcend’s light fixtures go for $999 each, and the company projects that each light will pay for itself in energy savings in the span of a year.
Bennett says they’re already receiving orders from commercial farming operations, and planning to launch an Indiegogo campaign later this summer for a second lighting product.
Wow. Indoor farming. I have no idea what crops this will help. /sarcasm
Infrared detection of grow houses is about to get just a bit more difficult.
Hydroponics is very cool.
Any preppers looking to keep the nasties out of the family garden, this is the way to go if you have ample power.
Wow. Indoor farming. I have no idea what crops this will help. /sarcasm
Indoor farming certain crops makes sense, you don’t have to use pesticides or herbicides as you can control the access to the plants / soil and you can grow with a 24/7 light cycle.
Pipe in some CO2 from a nearby coal station and one acre can produce what 1000 acres can in year!
El Chapo put in an order for 10k.
Hell, K-Mart has had blue lights for years.
really? any reference material supporting that?
LED grow light panels are nothing new.
LED grow light panels are nothing new
Cost seems to be in line with current LED technology.
I predict big sales in Washington, Oregon, and Colorado....
For growing tomatoes in winter time...
>>> Pipe in some CO2 from a nearby coal station... <<<
CO2 injection systems are already on the market to boost greenhouse production and in combination with lighting and temperature control it allows 2-3 crops per year of veggies.
Look up “LED binning” to see what this garbled article (stoned writer?) is effectively saying.
I don’t know about coal plants, but the greenhouse megastore sells the Johnson C02 Generator. Flower growers use them.
Note that the article mentions greenhouse farmers control CO2 levels. The numbers I’ve seen are that they run about 3X atmospheric concentrations.
CO2 isn’t so much a dangerous so-called greenhouse gas, as the Warmist Alarmists would have us believe; it is a plant growth stimulant!
The excessive electricity usage relative to the size and occupancy will no longer be a good indicator of a grow house...
sure, but i was interested in the 1000x over normal field output claim
if true, that’s when i get interested
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