Reference Standards, Uncertainties, and the Future of the NIST Electronic Kilogram

Published

July 1, 1999

Author(s)

Richard L. Steiner, David B. Newell, J. Schwarz, Edwin R. Williams

Abstract

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) watt balance experiment recently made a new determination of Planck's constant with a relative standard uncertainty of 87 x 10^-9 (k = 1), concurrently with an upper limit on the drift rate of the SI kilogram mass standard. This paper briefly describes the calibration work necessary to maintain several reference standards and subsystems for this experiment, and mentions several noise sources. These discussions suggest design improvements being built into the next generation electronic kilogram experiment, which will try to obtain 5 x 10^-9 relative standard uncertainty in order to monitor the SI kilogram.

Proceedings Title

Proc. 1999 National Conference of Standards Laboratories Workshop and Symposium (NCSL)

Conference Dates

July 11-15, 1999

Conference Location

Charlotte, NC

Pub Type

Conferences

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Keywords

Planck's constant uncertainties, watt balance uncertainties

Citation

Steiner, R. , Newell, D. , Schwarz, J. and Williams, E. (1999), Reference Standards, Uncertainties, and the Future of the NIST Electronic Kilogram, Proc. 1999 National Conference of Standards Laboratories Workshop and Symposium (NCSL), Charlotte, NC, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=8399 (Accessed October 11, 2025)