The question of swapping out the bulbs in a pre-existing light and replacing them with special grow bulbs versus buying a brand-new fixture that has built-in lighting is something most people consider. However, it depends on what one is looking for, either convenience and cost or specialized quality.

The former is the cheaper option. For most people, it is also easier to use. Just remove the old lamp that needs bulb replacement and replace it with a specially designed grow bulb.

The latter is more expensive, but it provides a more holistic solution. A single fixture is capable of providing light to multiple plants, dispersing the lighting evenly in a space. Because these fixtures are designed for grow light purposes, they offer a fuller light spectrum range than their cheaper counterpart.

Incandescent grow lights are the least expensive, but they’re also the least energy-efficient and have a high heat output. Fluorescent lights have a low heat signature and offer a good spectrum of light for growing. They come as tube lights or compact fluorescent reflectors. Growing with fluorescent lighting is a more energy-efficient solution than using incandescent lights, but the downside is they are more expensive.

For plant growth, the best colors are red lights in the 610-720 spectrum range, which promote flowering and budding, and violet-blue lights in the 400-520 nanometer range, which encourage chlorophyll absorption, photosynthesis, and growth.

Grow lights must be able to offer the proper spectrum of light for photosynthesis, which is vital for plant growth. Before purchasing any lighting, make sure you check out the color spectrum. Lights that offer the full spectrum are the ideal choice.

Finally, some good news about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch (GPGP) in the Pacific Ocean that offers hope for the future of our little blue planet. The Ocean Cleanup, a non-profit organization dedicated to developing technologies to remove all plastic from the ocean, reached an unbelievable milestone in July.

The organization announced that they had cleaned nearly 100,000kg (~ 220460lbs) of garbage from the Great Garbage Patch. Just to give you a perspective, that quantity is more than the combined weight of two Boeing 737-800s.

An Impressive Milestone

Since August last year, “Jenny,” also known as System 002, began harvesting plastic garbage from the GPGP in the North Pacific Ocean. If 100,000kg of plastic doesn’t sound like a grand milestone, there’s more. After a year of continuous effort, The Ocean Cleanup will enter into its next phase, where through System 003, the non-profit is hoping to remove plastic ten times higher than what has already been achieved. That’s right! The organization is working towards speeding up the plastic harvesting process by improving the harvesting technology.

In their announcement, The Ocean Cleanup shared that System 003 will be able to capture plastic at a rate potentially ten times higher than what System 002 was able to achieve. This would be possible as a combination of improved efficiency, increased size, and increased uptime.

A Long Journey Ahead

While System 003 sounds like quite the upgrade, there’s still a long road ahead for cleaning the ocean from garbage. It would take repeating the 100,000 kg removal about 1,000 times before the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is gone.

If the Ocean Cleanup partners with the Great Bubble Barrier, a Dutch invention that utilizes a wall of bubbles to trap plastic garbage in rivers, their joined technologies may lead to new and exciting technologies to speed up the waste removal process.

Who knows? Only time will tell!