Joseph B. Reid wrote: > Written material usually uses the tonne, but ton may occur in > material from US sources. We meet the long ton only rarely and then > the word "long" is usually stated.
This website illustrates the sort of thing that I was thinking of: http://www.cleanerandgreener.org/environment/canada.htm [begin quote] In March 1998, Suncor Energy agreed to purchase 100,000 metric tons of CO2 reductions from Niagara Mohawk, a US utility, with an option to buy an additional 10 million tons of emission reductions over 10 years. The 100,000 tons of reductions purchased will come from Niagara Mohawk's solar, wind, and biomass electricity generation in the years 1998-2000 [end quote] The phrase 'metric tons' is used initially but then it simply talks about 'tons'. I see other sites that talk merely about 'tons' of emissions. I get the impression that pollution discussions are always metric tons even if the word 'metric' is absent, even in the US. Perhaps pollution is a special case because of the international dimension.
