My diy setup was a bit over 500 watts from the wall, with 9 square feet, so a bit more than 55 watts/square foot - too much as it turned out... With the screw in bulbs I was using, I figure that max for the plants I grew was somewhere in the neighborhood of 35-40 watts/sq ft, and then only with some distance between bulbs and plants. The plants would likely have been very happy at less than 30 watts/sq.ft.