Gas Imperial to metric confused

simonfmduncan

I have seen a whole heap of stuff about the Gas imperial to metric conversion using a 2.83 multiplier

The thing I don't get is why multiply by 2.83

100 cubic feet = 2.8317 cubic metres

Ignoring the
Calorific calculations
Correction factors
Any volume corrections the Gas Company feels obliged to apply (another bugbear - Imagine if at the petrol pump they did this;

Just simply looking at the imperial to metric

100 cubic feet = 2.8317 cubic metres
1 cubic metre = 35.3 cubic feet


so if my meter reads in cubic feet that the value should be considerably less

Cardew

Welcome to the forum

Don't understand your point, unless you have missed the fact that an Imperial gas unit is 100 cubic feet. not 1 cubic foot.

An Imperial gas unit of 100 cubic feet is 2.83 times bigger than a metric gas unit of 1 cubic metre(which as you say is 35.3 cubic feet.

So if you have an Imperial gas meter, 1 gas unit is approx 31kWh and if you have a metric meter, 1 gas unit is approx 11.2kWh

Alan_Vickers

You need to remember that you pay for gas usage by kilowatt-hours (kWh) and not by the volume of gas sued.

The conversion to kWh is carried out from from cubic metres.

Each unit registerred by your gas meter represents 100 cubic feet of gas.

Therefore these units of 100s of cubic feet used must be converted to cubic metres used and this is done by multiplying by 2.83.

simonfmduncan

Fine and dandy, that is the point i wanted cleared up my meter doesn't say 100's Ft3 only Ft3 and it is just that they get away with whatever on the phone and don't make it clear.

simonfmduncan

if the service desk individual explained the fact that the meter was in 100's ft3 not 1 ft3 then i would not have been as wound up about the figures they use in the charts they create
but

Alan_Vickers

You can make things a bit easier for yourself if you remember to multiply the number of units read by the gas meter by 39 which will give you an approximate number of kWh used. The actual kWh used will depend upon the actual calorific value of the gas at that time - this does vary and should be quoted on your gas bill.

KimYeovil

Alan_Vickers wrote: »

You can make things a bit easier for yourself if you remember to multiply the number of units read by the gas meter by 39 which will give you an approximate ...

About 32 (or 33 if you want to over-estimate on the safe-side), not 39.

Alan_Vickers

Thanks for that Kim - my eyes and fingers are not quite in sync today - age telling on me a bit.

Plushchris

Why are you wanting to convert from cubic feet to cubic meters anyway?

Surely the only conversion you need to do is cubic feet to Kwh to work out costings?