Next Generation Energy Efficient Supplemental Lighting for Plant Production

Greenhouse farming is an absolute necessity to revive and create local agriculture industries in northern climatically challenged regions with short growing seasons. Controlled Environment Agriculture (CEA) has made significant strides in greenhouse farming technology. State of the art CEA farming utilizes direct control of lighting, temperature and CO2 in a hydroponics environment. Key advantages of CEA greenhouse farming include reduced use of pesticides, faster and higher quality growth, minimal transport costs to local customers, and "vine ripened" produce with minimal spoilage and contamination risks. For CEA greenhouse farming to be adopted in rural northern climates, progress is needed to reduce greenhouse-operating costs. While temperature does play some role, lighting continues to be the most significant limiting factor in the growth of several specialty crops. Providing adequate amounts of photo synthetically active radiation (PAR) has been shown to increase greenhouse production capacity to a level capable of supporting large market demand. The challenge for northern climates is to implement such supplemental lighting systems at a cost that makes CEA greenhouse farming competitive with large out of state centralized farm and ship sources. In Phase 2 Cycloptics is combining recently available high intensity discharge (HID) bulb technology with its patent-pending, optimized reflector designs to achieve unprecedented plant growth lighting energy and cost savings. The new HID bulbs feature small emitters and high PAR efficiency relative to previous HID bulbs, making them ideal for compact and highly energy efficient growth luminaires. Cycloptics can design both direct and indirect lighting reflectors for these HID bulbs that can be precisely engineered to a highly uniform distribution over large arbitrary patterns and depths. HID bulbs have up to now been problematic as PAR luminaires for growth applications. Plants nearer the source tended to be burned, while others were not getting enough light. The design and optical performance of Cycloptics reflectors allow them to be placed closer to the plant canopy, enabling smaller volume highly efficient energy curtains for cooler months. The innovative compact reflector design will translate to less shadowing of natural lighting in warmer months. It is the combination of target efficiency, compactness, and HID lamp energy efficiency that ultimately yields the energy and cost savings for the proposed luminaire.