Adding blue and red supplemental light increases biomass and yield of greenhouse-grown tomatoes (Kaiser et al., 2019). Supplemental lighting can also improve flavor and more importantly, can help to provide optimum light levels when natural light is lower than recommended.
Previous studies also showed, increasing 10 to 11 units of DLI (Summer-Winter) with supplemental lighting can increase hydroponic tomato yield by 30% (Celina & Mitchell, 2016).
There are different types of light sources when speaking about supplemental lighting: High pressure sodium lamps, metal halide lamps and light emitting diodes (LEDs). LED lighting offers the option to create light recipes to meet specific crop necessities at the highest efficiency. When selecting a lamp for supplemental lighting in a tomato greenhouse it is important to consider the light spectrum. White light can be a great source of light for your crop. However let’s focus on efficiency and light intensity. When speaking about how plants will react to light, we need to remember most light used for photosynthesis will be located in the blue and red spectrum. Natural light present inside greenhouses is already providing a full spectrum of light. Therefore, the advice will be to focus on the light “colors” where we know plants will work the most when selecting a lamp for supplemental lighting purposes.
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