LED vs HPS Grow Room Setup ROI

Ok, I am going to do a little cost analysis looking at setting up a new commercial grow and I will show you why going with quality LED is a no brainer due to the rapid return on investment (ROI) and long term savings. I just did a tent run with LED and I know that I can produce the same or better yields per square foot with LED at 600 watts vs HPS at 1000 watts. Now I am looking at a setup with a lot of lights and was doing math to see what lighting I want to run.

Lets make a few variables for this project:

Electrical Cost per kWh = $0.20
LED Fixture Cost = $800 (Timber Redwood VS)
HPS Fixture Cost = $300 (1000 watt HPS)
Lets say for the sake of this project that those prices get lights that produce the same yield per square foot.

Lets value the HPS lights at 5000 btu/hr each
Lets value the LED lights at about 2400 btu/hr each

Lets do a flowering room (12/12) with 48 lights

HPS we need 20 tons of AC
LED we need 9.6 tons of AC (10 tons)

So we spend twice as much on buying AC for the HPS setup and a little over twice as much for the LED lights vs HPS.

LED Lights = $38400
HPS Lights = $14400
LED AC = $10000
HPS AC = $20000

So for the HPS we pay $34,400 and LED we pay $48,400, a difference of $14,000.

Now lets math in electrical savings and we will cut the power bill lets say by a very conservative figure of 40% ish due to the lesser energy usage on AC and lighting and we are easily saving around $3300 per month on electrical if we go with LED. Did a bunch of mathematical gyrations in excel to get some estimates and I believe them to be within 10% assuming the $0.20 cost per kWh.

So at $3300 per month we can make up the $14,000 difference in startup cost in the first 17 weeks worth of electrical savings (4.25 months). After that we are basically making $3300 a month more profit, so in this case around $25,575 extra profit in the first year and $39,600 added profit in subsequent years, more as energy costs rise.



Even with my rough figures on costs and such you definitely get paid back within a year. Even with lower electrical costs. I know I can get the HPS lights cheaper but I also can figure on a discount on the LED in such quantity.

In the end I think the error rate on the variables sorta evens out in the wash and the case is overwhelming to go with LED provided you can get the same yields and quality. We also probably save even more on AC since we need to run the room warmer due to leaf surface temperatures and the lack of IR.

I didn't get into CMH here because I see it as sort of a middle ground and a rather gray area when it comes to yield and heat production. I rather not even bother with trying to run those numbers in this particular thought experiment.

There is no doubt in my mind that I will go with LED when I do my commercial building here soon as I have already proven to myself that I can achieve the same or better yield per square foot and same or better quality with LED. I never thought I would be saying that, been hard core HPS all my life. Times are a changing!

Sorry for my rambling... peace out!

Just some stoned mathematical gyrations that were mentioned, entirely not accurate by any stretch of the imagination lol

I like it, good post, this will create some good discussion i think.


I own and have grown with all 3. I think i can safely say id choose LED if i was filling a warehouse.

diggs99 said:

I own and have grown with all 3. I think i can safely say id choose LED if i was filling a warehouse.

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Well vote on the poll brother!

Everyone PLEASE VOTE! lol

I wasn't sure man,had to think about it , that last option was tempting lol

We didn't even add in savings of not changing bulbs or maintaining twice as many AC units.

I would actually do both, LED in the hotter months and HID in winter when I actually want that heat.

I think your assuming a lot to say they will yield the same per sq ft so early on.

growingforfun said:

I think your assuming a lot to say they will yield the same per sq ft so early on.

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Well having done it already on a small scale I think I won't have issues doing it on a large scale as I am a rather experienced grower. That said one never can count any chickens until they are hatched and this is all hypothetical and best case indeed.

If there was a loss in yield then it wouldnt take much to offset any savings in energy. But if the yields are better, and they could be, then the opposite is true. The potential is there.

DaFreak said:

I would actually do both, LED in the hotter months and HID in winter when I actually want that heat.

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In the winter I still have to run my AC's using HPS, and with LED I would be making plenty of BTU's to heat the room especially with the planned spray foam insulation. Figuring about 9.6 tons of heat will be generated by LED in a 1500 sqft room, there will be walkways and canopy area is about 768 sqft. That doesn't include propane CO2 generator and dehumidifier heat.

How did you do your test to determine you get the same yield per sq ft? I am interested in watching you and diggs run these led and see if you guys are getting the weight and quality. I see all your numbers and they make a good case for led as long as it scales up from a tent to a large room. I've seen some pretty big facilities try running led only to go back to hps. And I have personally had terrible experience with led, even on a bad run under hid I have never had to wash a whole tent because it wasn't good enough quality. I am positive it was user error but like I said user error with hid might mean a lil lower yield but I've never had such terrible quality.

Now the reason I would like to go led is so I can do a two tier grow and basically double my sq ft of canopy. So I'm just gonna watch and see how you guys do, plus I just got these de hps so def need to get some return on them before thinking of upgrading again. If I go led it would likely be at my new place, so I got time to watch and see how you guys do. (Plus if I ever get time I can play with my quantum boards some more and see if I can get better at them)

I think you wrote somewhere, that you pull about 1 gpw. Now what if you changed a few things in your grow and where able to hit 1.5 - 2 gpw ?

Is the LEDs still an advantage?

Apalchen said:

How did you do your test to determine you get the same yield per sq ft?

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I ran my 2x4 tent with a LED at 300 watts and pulled 15.5 zips with 3 runts, easily could have been 20 zips.

BigHornBuds said:

I think you wrote somewhere, that you pull about 1 gpw. Now what if you changed a few things in your grow and where able to hit 1.5 - 2 gpw ?

Is the LEDs still an advantage?

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Well lets talk yield per sqft. Lets say that whatever was done to improve the HPS yields was also done with the LED?

Really it is my belief that I can get the yield per sqft numbers to be at least as good as with HPS. Honestly I think I can do better due to the fact you don't have a really bright hot spot and dim edges with the LED. Every square foot of canopy is pretty close to optimal light levels with the LED.

Renfro said:

Well lets talk yield per sqft. Lets say that whatever was done to improve the HPS yields was also done with the LED?

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I really don’t know.
I have no experience with LEDs , and how plants react to training under them.

It's gonna take me and my partner at least a year, probably more to get the grow built and running, 2 rooms, each 48 lights ish on a flip. Plus a significant veg room for moms and clones. It would be a no veg SOG setup. 2304 plants per flowering room lol. With the need to have security and everything done to state requirements I figure I will have it running at full speed by two years. Most likely we will build out one flowering room first and let the first harvest from it pay for the equipment needed to get the second flowering room running.

Figure just 4 harvests per year with room cleanup and harvest time and whatnot, could do better, like 4.5 even. Load like 4-8 trays a day and harvest like 4-8 a day. Pull 64 to 80 zips per 4x8 tray per run, both rooms should be able to do a total of 768 - 960 pounds a year.

So even if all the overhead was stupid high at say 20k per month, or 1.5x what I anticipate for utilities, nutrients and trim labor, and wholesale is only 1k per unit, the building is gonna be able to profit 500 - 700k per year. So as long as the yields are there it will make money anyway you go, just how much money, at that scale just adding a few grams per sqft adds up to 7 pounds a run. One consideration is the cost of pulling power to the building.

With the lesser power requirements of the LED setup I can anticipate it being cheaper to get the power drop (transformer and whatnot) from the POCO so that may offset the cost difference right there since we are talking like 400 amp vs 600 amp type numbers even with the flip to split the power in half for flowering. Transformers arent cheap and we are looking at something like 120 or 180 kVa.

Renfro said:

Well having done it already on a small scale I think I won't have issues doing it on a large scale as I am a rather experienced grower. That said one never can count any chickens until they are hatched and this is all hypothetical and best case indeed.

If there was a loss in yield then it wouldnt take much to offset any savings in energy. But if the yields are better, and they could be, then the opposite is true. The potential is there.

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Well I know that you know what your doing, but leds are known to excel in tents as far as I know, and your large room style may not translate the same is what I'm thinking. If it does then this will be the first example I'm aware of.

SOG is a lot different then your current setup, and a lot easier to do.

Currently I run 8 pre light . If I was doing SOG I’d have 64 in the same space .
It’s kinda apples to oranges

BigHornBuds said:

SOG is a lot different then your current setup, and a lot easier to do.

Currently I run 8 pre light . If I was doing SOG I’d have 64 in the same space .
It’s kinda apples to oranges

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I used to run no veg SoG back in Missouri, did great things with it pulling a gram per watt. Also did a no veg SoG in the tent and only had 8 plants in a 2x4 where I would normally have 24 plants in my previous SoG setups.