I can see where the terms megalitre, gigalitre and teralitre would be less cumbersome for the public then their equivalents of cubic dekametres, cubic hectometres and cubic kilometres.
I can see the cubic units being used in scientific and engineering endeavors and the litre multiples for the common people. We would all know they are the same but we can each choose to pick terms that are simple. Would anyone want to see petrol pumps selling by the cubic decimetre as opposed to the litre even though the cubic decimetre is a derived SI unit and the litre is not? Can anyone see fuel consumption expressed as cubic decimetres per hundred kilometres? Jerry ________________________________ From: Pat Naughtin <[email protected]> To: U.S. Metric Association <[email protected]> Sent: Friday, April 10, 2009 10:33:15 PM Subject: [USMA:44561] Re: FPLA 2010 Dear Stan, In the Australian water supply industry, kilolitres, megalitres, and gigalitres are commonly used. Cheers, Pat Naughtin Geelong, Australia On 2009/04/10, at 7:40 PM, STANLEY DOORE wrote: I am NOT advocating larger multiple units than the kL (m^3). Larger multiples than the kL would be too complex, cumbersome and not user-friendly. Virtually all people are accustomed to the L and submultiples thereof as they buy medicine and products in stores. The kL would be very useful for things such as rain barrels, ponds, stream flow and other every day things to which people can relate. People can relate to the kL which is a clean and useful expression of everyday large volume. In the case of river flow and water and sewage systems, the use of gallons per minute are incomprehensible because it has no easy direct relationship to SI volume whereas kL (cubic meters) do. The use of L and not kL is also incomprehensible for stream flow because the numbers are so large. The NIST should be the leader in advocating the use of kL in the public domain. The cubic meter and multiples and submultiples thereof should be used in engineering and science. To be consistent, those who do not advocate the use of the kL for everyday use also should be against the use of the L and submultiples thereof. Stan Doore ----- Original Message ----- From: <[email protected]> To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[email protected]> Sent: Wednesday, April 08, 2009 2:02 PM Subject: [USMA:44488] Re: FPLA 2010 Stan and Pierre, I think you have some good arguments for allowing larger multiples of the liter in *common parlance*. If you are able to persuade the CCU, CIPM, and NIST to accept multiples greater than one, I'll be among the last to object, but in Science and Technology, I'm with John. The coherence of SI is more important, without the liter and its multiples, except, perhaps, in medical practice. Gene. ---- Original message ---- Date: Wed, 8 Apr 2009 10:39:48 -0400 From: Pierre Abbat <[email protected]> Subject: [USMA:44483] Re: FPLA 2010 To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[email protected]> On Wednesday 08 April 2009 08:32:21 STANLEY DOORE wrote: I disagree with the NIST in the case of kL because L is used widely and well known in the public sector. Are you suggesting that mm^3 be used instead of L? Stan Doore I too disagree with the NIST. A liter is a cubic decimeter, a kiloliter is a cubic meter, a megaliter is a cubic decameter, a gigaliter is a cubic hectometer, a teraliter is a cubic kilometer, a petaliter is a cubic - what? You can't express the petaliter as the cube of a named unit. Likewise the exaliter. Contrariwise, you can't express the cubic yottameter or cubic zeptometer as a prefixed liter. As to the tonne, I wouldn't use it with any prefix. There are so many kinds of tons and tuns that just saying "tonne" instead of "megagram" is not worth the loss of clarity. The stere has been deprecated, but I think it's still useful as a jargon unit, since it has only one syllable compared to four for both alternatives.. I still sometimes think in steres, since my father grew up with the unit. Pierre Pat Naughtin PO Box 305 Belmont 3216, Geelong, Australia Phone: 61 3 5241 2008 Metric system consultant, writer, and speaker, Pat Naughtin, has helped thousands of people and hundreds of companies upgrade to the modern metric system smoothly, quickly, and so economically that they now save thousands each year when buying, processing, or selling for their businesses. Pat provides services and resources for many different trades, crafts, and professions for commercial, industrial and government metrication leaders in Asia, Europe, and in the USA. Pat's clients include the Australian Government, Google, NASA, NIST, and the metric associations of Canada, the UK, and the USA. See http://www.metricationmatters.com/ or to get the free 'Metrication matters' newsletter go to: http://www.metricationmatters.com/newsletter to subscribe.
