any cost/benefit analysis done on HID vs. Induction lighting?

Hello All,
I have never grown indoors so please forgive my ignorance. This is more of a economics question:
Has there been any cost/benefit analysis done on HID vs. Induction lighting (yield vs. cost of ownership)?

I’ve read there is a larger yield (size and weight) on HID but then you need lots of amps, ducting, cooling, bulb replacement, etc. versus Induction gives a smaller yield but less infrastructure is needed, cost of acquisition/operation is less, 15 year life on bulbs, etc.

If you were to start a brand new grow op tomorrow, what would you use? And why?

afaik almost everyone uses hid. I'm not aware of any commercial growers that run anything else. some ppl are happy with led for personal grows. Theres alot of hype @ led, plasma, induction... Theres endless charts and par "studies" that show they should be the best thing ever. but somehow side by side grows that can be replicated and show competitive results never seem to materialize. led or cfl are ok if you jusat want a few ounces of fluffy bud for yourself. but if yield and bag appeal matter to you, imo theres nothing that can compete with hid at this time.

edit: as for your original question afaik hid wins gpw. tons of other tech. have claimed otherwise, but the proof never seems to materialize. There's a lot of money in selling the latest greatest thing to new growers. I thing pt Barnum said something about that.

Hmmm...I gotta buy some lights and want to do it cost effectively but also correctly.

1itsme like to chime in i am a cfl grower. fluffy buds is def a stretch i produce just as hard dense buds as anyone i know with hid.
sure hid produces larger but fluffy is not true at all. i trun everything in a 2x2 room and have pulled 10 ounces in 8 months.
first row is rock hard blue widow buds pulled about 3 ounces off 375w cfl.

a pineapple express nug from cfl's that is 7g's dried and rock hard.

some liberty haze buds pulled 5.5 ounces off 500w cfl in a 2x2 cab. first indoor grow

They all have their pros and cons. it is really a matter of choice and upfront investment.

HID- the norm. expensive bulbs. hassles of balasts. use the most energy. tried and tested. I have never used.

CFL- used to do CFL. Cheap, easy, can get what you need anywhere. Poor penetration. my buds were a bit airy but not bad. Biggest reason I switched is that in flower, it is a pain in the butt to keep moving lights and arranging plants to keep the lights right on top the plants. Especially during early flower stretch.

LED - using now. most expensive to start out, you want a good one. minimal power usage. sits well above the canopy. no heat to contend with (which I am learning creates some challenges)

induction - much like LED from when i looked into it. Use more juice, more in line with CFL. Would have my second choice to LED when I upgraded.

I am sure some with disagree with me on my generic statements. just how I look at it as someone who recently "upgraded" from CFL. i may actually end up going back to CFL for veg. As things stand today, it worked a little better in my setup/environment. But I am making some tweaks I hope will accomodate.

what I do . is use hps. and the walls have t5 there are 8 bulbs total in the t5. so 4 of them are 2700 k 2 are 6500k and 2 are 10000k . combined with the 600 hps it makes a sexy looking plant high quality buds and a massive yield all in one. this is the very best way you can do it vs any light on the market.

A lot of people bring up the heat that HID lamps produce and the cost of ventilation/AC as a drawback to using them against something else (e.g. fluorescent bulbs). The heat certainly can be an issue, but as GrowingDad noted it can also end up being the other way around. Where it is particularly cool or cold, the heat of HID lamps is just an added bonus.

The amount of energy you use just depends on the lamps you use an how many of them; just like with CFL. More people use HID because they produce significantly more lumen per watt than CFL bulbs... 2-3x more depending on the bulb type/wattage. The 600 and 800 watt HID lamps tend to be more efficient, and high pressure sodium lamps produce more total lumen/watt than metal halides.

In other words a 250 watt HID lamp which [initially] produces 24,000 lumen is more or less equivalent to 15 x 23 watt CFL lamps (each @ 1,600 lumens) which are collectively using 354 watts.

LED is supposed to be superior to HID lamps in terms of the lumens they produce per watt of energy use, and the fact that you can customize the spectrum with different colored LED bulbs. I've been told by a couple people maybe a year ago now that they just weren't really ready for growing of anything other than at a small scale. I imagine light penetration is an issue with LEDs as well, but I haven't used them and can't relate any firsthand experience. I do know however, that the higher wattage HID bulb you have the more intense/penetrating the light is going to be. A thousand watt HID lamp is very bright.

In other words a 250 watt HID lamp which [initially] produces 24,000 lumen is more or less equivalent to 15 x 23 watt CFL lamps (each @ 1,600 lumens) which are collectively using 354 watts.

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When comparing plant lights who has the higher lumen output is not the metric one should rely on as lumen is a human visual value with the least correlation to plant spectra. This link may help you understand the differences in these values with unbiased technical comparisons beginning on page 6. http://www.inda-gro.com/pdf/MeasuringPlantLight.pdf

I'm not aware of any commercial growers that run anything else.

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I am. http://www.frequency.com/video/maryanns-420pontoon-garden/87694801

I am not getting that technical. I am aware of PAR and differences in visible spectrum, but HIDs still produce more light per watt. MH produces a bit less lumen per watt than HPS, but more plant usable light... unfortunately most bulbs don't indicate how much of the light they produce is available to plants, or compare it to the "ideal" spectrum for plant growth.

It is unfortunate. Are you suggesting that manufacturers might indicate how much of the light they produce is in the three plant usable absorption areas?