My dear Bruce:
With trepidation, I must point out that among the reasons for the US not being
metric yet is that a leading figure in the metrication effort considers
"billion kilowatts perfectly good SI".
The English speaking word was (is) not my only audience. My audience was (is)
the world, world where some countries speak English and English only, some
countries speak English as a second language, and some that speak non-English
languages only . But they all, no exception, know of W (not necessarily of
watt) and, thanks to computers, of G.
ASME is ASME International. International does not mean English speaking. SI is
international in that other sense. This might lead to understanding why
"billion of kilowatts" cannot be SI, let alone perfectly so. All countries have
translators and interpreters, who, you might notice, are to be superfluous for
SI.
Finally, the editors did not miss recognizing GW. The editors, as most editors
do, objected to NUMBERS is what I wrote. Furthermore the next sentence was:
"It has been my experience with most publications that they resent numbers ("we
do not want to confuse our readers" (!)).
Stan
----- Original Message -----
From: Bruce Barrow
To: Stan Jakuba ; [email protected]
Cc: U.S. Metric Association
Sent: 09 May 07, Thursday 09:25
Subject: Re: [SI] Letter to ed
My dear Stan,
You misunderstood my message. I specifically recommended "billions of
kilowatts", which is perfectly good SI, and would be clear to editors who don't
recognize GW. Yes, I know you have a phobia about billions, as does your
favorite SI10 standard, but the English speaking world, which was your
audience, knows that a billion is a thousand million.
Bruce
----- Original Message -----
From: Stan Jakuba
To: Bruce Barrow ; [email protected]
Cc: U.S. Metric Association
Sent: Wednesday, May 06, 2009 6:55 PM
Subject: Re: [SI] Letter to ed
Bruce:
Using GW has little to do with it being known or unknown. Any number of
energy units in use are not known to somebody (many!) and that is one of the
reasons why the science/engineering illiterate American politicians cannot
agree on the energy issues.
Among the dozens of units and symbols for energies one sees, I particularly
dislike "millions of tonnes of oil equivalents" and similar contraptions.
The GW is not any more confusing than those contraptions including millions
of quads per fortnight, or billions of watts, or this beauty (I quote): ".....
an average of about 66 megawatt hours in an hour."
I observe that more Americans know of W than of hp, let alone Btu/hr (per
min, sec, day, ...) or whatever made-up unit. And who knows how much a billion
is? There are peoples to whom "billion" means not the US billion even in
English, and ASME is "ASME International".
You and me are in the business of promoting metric for the good of this
country. When then would you suggest we start using SI to reap its full
advantage?
The I-P peoples, it seems to me, learn units by assimilation of the
observed rather than systematically. Thus seeing and hearing SI units and
prefixes will sink in (gets learned) just as any other unit did. People do not
need to be told it is metric. The GW can be viewed just as the Btu, quad, or
tonne of oil equivalents.
We have been "selling metric" and failing as you point out. It's time to
change course. Sell units, forget about selling metric. How to sell units? Use
them. When? Now. Where? Everywhere.
Aside from the metrication promotion, I cannot imagine trying to show the
renewables analyses results in anything but coherent units. It happens that the
only coherent units are SI. Not my fault - I'd have to invent it if it did not
exist.
Thanks for the comment.
Stan
----- Original Message -----
From: Bruce Barrow
To: [email protected]
Sent: 09 May 06, Wednesday 08:55
Subject: Re: [SI] Letter to ed
Stan, I certainly support your discussions on renewable energy. Let me
respectfully suggest that the problem with your sales pitch as a sales pitch
may be not the numbers, but the GW. Is that symbol known to mechanical
engineers? Is the gigawatt understandable to that audience? Would billions of
kilowatts have been more easily received?
We have a giga-ntic problem in selling metric -- it is tera-bly confusing
to the general public, and possibly even to mechanical engineers. :-)
Bruce
----- Original Message -----
From: Stan Jakuba
To: [email protected]
Sent: Tuesday, May 05, 2009 9:49 PM
Subject: [SI] Letter to ed
The Mechanical Engineering magazine published an excerpt from the
letter I had posted here earlier. Unfortunately, the published version, while
promoting metric, omitted the metric numbers.
Here is the MSWord version of the original.
It has been my experience with most publications that they resent
numbers ("we do not want to confuse our readers" (!)). Maybe my engineering
background makes me think that numbers are more useful than adjectives such as
huge, expensive, skyrocketing, ..... that one reads and hear endlessly. But I
do agree that numbers in I-P units can indeed be confusing. :-)
Stan Jakuba
