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therms, btu's, tons, gigajoules, barrels, kilowatt-hours
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therms, btu's, tons, gigajoules, barrels, kilowatt-hours
by Keith_McClary » Fri 25 Nov 2005, 04:55:14
This has been discussed before, but I was reading an article on the high price of natural gas in UK, quoted in British pounds/therm. I am paying $10 Canadian/gigajoule. How does that compare? After a few seconds of Google research I find $this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 't')herm. Unit of energy defined as 105 British thermal units; equivalent to 1.055 × 108 J. It is no longer in scientific use.
My gas water heater is rated in btu's (per hour perhaps?). I thought it was practically a criminal offense to use non-metric units in UK. If I had a PhD. in relativistic quantum physics (which I do) and I was not too lazy (which I am) I could figure out the relative costs of gas in UK/Canada.Next I am reading an article on Chinese oil reserves, quoted in tons ... is that the same as tonnes, and how does it relate to barrels (I know a barrel is forty-some US gallons, US gallons being some fraction of an Imperial gallon).
(EDIT) A little more research yields this : $this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 't')herm (thm)
a commercial unit of heat energy. The therm is equal to 100 000 Btu. Because there have been several definitions of the Btu, there are two official definitions of the therm. In the U.S., the legal definition (made in 1968) is that the therm equals 105.4804 megajoules. The European Union's definition, made in 1979 using the more current IT Btu, is 105.5060 megajoules. Either way the therm is equal to about 25 200 (large) calories or about 29.3 kilowatt hours of electrical energy. One therm can also be provided by about 96.7 cubic feet of natural gas. The therm has sometimes been confused with the thermie (see below). The names of both units come from the Greek word for heat, therme.
thermie (th)
a metric unit of heat energy, part of the meter-tonne-second system sometimes used by European engineers. The thermie is equal to the amount of energy required to raise the temperature of 1 tonne of water by 1°C. The thermie is equivalent to 1000 (large) calories , 4.1868 megajoules or 3968.3 Btu.
Do I need a
here?-
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Re: therms, btu's, tons, gigajoules, barrels, kilowatt-hours
by aahala » Fri 25 Nov 2005, 13:28:35
There was a long running US sitcom, where a main character would
introduce his non-talking brothers -- "This is my brother Larry
and this is my other brother Larry".
They didn't look anything alike, but whenever anyone mentioned Larry
it was always the other one.
Damn these measurement units. Tons, short tones, long tons, tonnes.
We need a PhD in measurement, with a concentration in energy, to
make sense of it all.
introduce his non-talking brothers -- "This is my brother Larry
and this is my other brother Larry".
They didn't look anything alike, but whenever anyone mentioned Larry
it was always the other one.
Damn these measurement units. Tons, short tones, long tons, tonnes.
We need a PhD in measurement, with a concentration in energy, to
make sense of it all.
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Re: therms, btu's, tons, gigajoules, barrels, kilowatt-hours
by donshan » Fri 25 Nov 2005, 14:37:48
Take a look at the US Energy Information Agency Kid's page that has very good educational materials on the science, as well as on line calculators that convert back and forth with all these units.
http://www.eia.doe.gov/kids/energyfacts ... lator.html
A broader online calculator that includes metric units too is at:
http://www.onlineconversion.com/energy.htm
A useful list of oil conversions is at:
http://www.eppo.go.th/ref/UNIT-OIL.html
For those who use a Macintosh computer with OSX be aware that the free calculator that comes with the operating system includes a complete units converter too as well as math functions. The currency converter can be updated from the internet to allow conversions of energy between various world currencies. Conversions in the calculator in both English and Metric units include:
Area
Currency
Energy or Work
Temperature
Length
Speed
Pressure
Weights and Measures
Power
Volume
http://www.eia.doe.gov/kids/energyfacts ... lator.html
A broader online calculator that includes metric units too is at:
http://www.onlineconversion.com/energy.htm
A useful list of oil conversions is at:
http://www.eppo.go.th/ref/UNIT-OIL.html
For those who use a Macintosh computer with OSX be aware that the free calculator that comes with the operating system includes a complete units converter too as well as math functions. The currency converter can be updated from the internet to allow conversions of energy between various world currencies. Conversions in the calculator in both English and Metric units include:
Area
Currency
Energy or Work
Temperature
Length
Speed
Pressure
Weights and Measures
Power
Volume
Last edited by donshan on Fri 25 Nov 2005, 14:47:50, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: therms, btu's, tons, gigajoules, barrels, kilowatt-hours
by clv101 » Fri 25 Nov 2005, 14:45:14
I sometimes think the range of units in common use in the energy industry is an intentional ploy to keep lay people (and many decision makers/politicians) from sticking their noses in.
"Everything is proceeding as I have foreseen." The Emperor (Return of the Jedi)
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Re: therms, btu's, tons, gigajoules, barrels, kilowatt-hours
by donshan » Fri 25 Nov 2005, 15:07:56
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('clv101', 'I') sometimes think the range of units in common use in the energy industry is an intentional ploy to keep lay people (and many decision makers/politicians) from sticking their noses in.
True! If people knew what was going on the politicians could not get by with knowing little more than can be said in a 15 second sound bite.
A much more serious problem is the American myopia on continuing the archaic English units system, but that is also consistent with "go it alone" policies in other areas too.
This confusion of units causes countless mistakes. One prime example was the loss of the NASA Mars Climate orbiter mission a few years ago when the science group used metric units, and the engineering group used English units and someone did not convert properly leading to a wrong retro-burn time of the rocket to slow the spacecraft causing it to crash land. Just $372 million and a decade of work down the tubes,
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/met ... 20356.html
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he Mars Climate Orbiter was to collect weather data when it was lost in September as it attempted to maneuver into orbit around the planet. Young's panel attributed the failure to navigational errors caused by an embarrassing mix-up over whether metric or U.S. measurements were being used.
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