A cubic metre per second (m³s⁻¹, m³/s, cumecs or cubic meter per second in

American English American English, sometimes called United States English or U.S. English, is the set of varieties of the English language native to the United States. English is the most widely spoken language in the United States and in most circumstances ...

) is the unit of

volumetric flow rate In physics and engineering, in particular fluid dynamics, the volumetric flow rate (also known as volume flow rate, or volume velocity) is the volume of fluid which passes per unit time; usually it is represented by the symbol (sometimes ). I ...

in the International System of Units (SI) equal to that of a

stere The stere or stère (st) is a unit of volume in the original metric system equal to one cubic metre. The stere is typically used for measuring large quantities of firewood or other cut wood, while the cubic meter is used for uncut wood. The nam ...

cube In geometry, a cube is a three-dimensional solid object bounded by six square faces, facets or sides, with three meeting at each vertex. Viewed from a corner it is a hexagon and its net is usually depicted as a cross. The cube is the on ...

with sides of in

length Length is a measure of distance. In the International System of Quantities, length is a quantity with dimension distance. In most systems of measurement a base unit for length is chosen, from which all other units are derived. In the Inte ...

exchanged or moving each second. It is popularly used for water flow, especially in

river A river is a natural flowing watercourse, usually freshwater Fresh water or freshwater is any naturally occurring liquid or frozen water containing low concentrations of dissolved salts and other total dissolved solids. Although the ...

s and streams, and fractions for

HVAC Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) is the use of various technologies to control the temperature, humidity, and purity of the air in an enclosed space. Its goal is to provide thermal comfort and acceptable indoor air quality. ...

values measuring air flow. The term cumec is also used, as shorthand for "Cubic metres per second", with the plural form ''cumecs'' also common in speech. It is commonly used between workers in the measurement of water flow through natural streams and civil works, but rarely used in writing. Data in units of cumec are used along the

y-axis A Cartesian coordinate system (, ) in a plane is a coordinate system that specifies each point uniquely by a pair of numerical coordinates, which are the signed distances to the point from two fixed perpendicular oriented lines, measured i ...

or vertical axis of a flow

hydrograph A hydrograph is a graph showing the rate of flow ( discharge) versus time past a specific point in a river, channel, or conduit carrying flow. The rate of flow is typically expressed in cubic meters or cubic feet per second (cms or cfs). It can al ...

, which describes the time variation of discharge of a river (the

mean There are several kinds of mean in mathematics, especially in statistics. Each mean serves to summarize a given group of data, often to better understand the overall value ( magnitude and sign) of a given data set. For a data set, the '' ari ...

velocity multiplied by cross-sectional area). A moderately sized river discharges in the order of 100 cumecs.

Conversions

References

See also