John M. Steele
Sat, 07 Aug 2010 18:52:56 -0700
This article http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/pune/PMC-spills-fuzzy-logic-on-water-intake/articleshow/6267507.cms was full of strange acronyms related to water measurement, TMC, MLD that weren't defined.
A little googling shows that TMC is thousand million cubic feet of water used in bulk water measurement in India. This city gets 11.5 TMC per year from one source. That is supposed to work out to 840 MLD. A little more Googling determines MLD is million liters per day. (which does not check out with 135 L/d per occupant, and a population of 3.5 million. Of course, it turns out the city can't measure water flow anyway, they just estimate. What a hodgepodge of units. 1 TCM = 28.3 hm³ (or GL) approx. They allege TCM is an American term, but I've never seen it before. In fact, I think we would use BCF, billion cubic feet. But they were never an American colony, and didn't like us very well during the Cold War. Why would they adopt an American term? Anyone know the origin? I am mostly familiar with the acre-foot as a bulk water measure in the US.