Will solarpanels get enuf electricity from xcess lite in indoor hydro garden, to run fans pumps etc ?

Question

is it possible to power the small appliences like pumps and fan and water heater from the excess light of 1400watts of high pressure sodium lights

Answer 1

I suppose that you could use panels to generate some power to charge a battery and operate something. Probably won't get a whole lot of power.

Your idea has some merrit in that you want to recover growning light that would otherwise be wasted.  Increase the efficiency of the growing system by "recovering" energy.

  THe downside to this (besides cost and payback time) is that the solar panels take up space. Positioning the panels means either shading areas that could grow plants or having the plants shade the panels.  Either way would reduce the efficiency of the panels and of the overall system.  You either recover some energy (always much less than you expend) and / or you have less room to grow plants or effect yeild(plant growth).

You may want to look at conservation of energy expenditure to boost system efficiency.     For example 1400watts of light suspended from the ceiling may be spreading light over a larger area than necessary.  Placing the lights closer to the plants concentrates the light to a smaller area.  With concentrated light (because of the reduced hight over the plants) you could reduce your wattage to obtain a proper light level.   Reducing watts consumed is far more effective than attempting to recover  wasted energy.

You would be better served in channeling your efforts to optimizing your existing system.