The percentage of light absorbed by the leaf:

Explanation

Although a leaf absorbs a large portion of sunlight-typically around 80-90%-only a very small fraction of that light is actually converted into chemical energy through photosynthesis. In fact, the efficiency of this conversion is roughly 1%, meaning that only about 1% of the sunlight that strikes a leaf is transformed into glucose and other chemical compounds that the plant can use for growth and energy. The rest of the absorbed light is lost as heat or reflected as fluorescence. Therefore, while leaves appear green because they absorb most wavelengths except green, the actual percentage of light energy harnessed for photosynthesis is surprisingly low.