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PAR



It turns out that PAR is not a very good efficiency measure for the
quality of light require for plant growth either (compared to lumens).
It refers to Photosynthetically Active Radiation (the initials). It has
no weighting factor for the active growth spectra of plants, the so
called red and blue peaks. It has flat weighting. 

Somebody should design a light measuring device for plant growth
efficiency. Is there such a thing? The standard unit of measure should
be one Elvis. (plural Elvii) ;-)

My suggestion would be to simply have about 20 watts of fluorescent
lighting per square foot of tank area and use either energy efficient
T-8 bulbs or a mixture of GE plant & aquarium bulbs (or any grow light)
and a cool white bulb so your eyes can see the plants. Replace the bulbs
on a rotating frequency each 12 months or so. If you want nice red
plants, double the number of bulbs.

Elvis