GW
Abbreviation with 3 meanings
| Stands for | Gigawatt |
|---|---|
| Meanings | 3 |
| Categories | Units & Measurements, Science & Engineering, Geography & Places |
GW has three meanings. The most common are Gigawatt (engineering unit) and Gravitational wave (physics); it can also stand for Guinea-Bissau.
Meanings of GW at a glance
| # | GW stands for | Context |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Gigawatt | Units & Measurements › Engineering Unit |
| 2 | Gravitational wave | Science & Engineering › Physics |
| 3 | Guinea-Bissau | Geography & Places › Country Code |
1. Gigawatt
Units & Measurements · Engineering Unit Abbreviations
A billion watts: the scale of large power stations, national grid capacity and major infrastructure projects. A large nuclear reactor produces about 1 GW of electricity, and peak US summer electricity demand exceeds 700 GW.
Example: The country added 30 GW of new solar capacity last year, a national record.
Clean-energy targets and national installed capacity are usually quoted in GW, as are the largest AI data-center campuses, some planned at a gigawatt or more. Gigawatts measure capacity; actual generation over time is counted in GWh or TWh.
2. Gravitational wave
Science & Engineering · Physics Abbreviations
Ripple in the fabric of spacetime produced by accelerating masses, such as merging black holes or neutron stars, and traveling at the speed of light. Gravitational waves stretch and squeeze space by tiny amounts as they pass, and detectors such as LIGO and Virgo now record dozens of events a year.
Example: The GW signal from the neutron star merger arrived 1.7 seconds before a burst of gamma rays.
Einstein predicted gravitational waves in 1916. Indirect evidence came from the Hulse-Taylor binary pulsar, discovered in 1974 and recognized with the 1993 Nobel Prize. The 2017 merger GW170817 was also seen in light, confirming that such collisions forge heavy elements such as gold. In power engineering GW means gigawatt.
3. Guinea-Bissau
Geography & Places · Country Code Abbreviations
Guinea-Bissau, a former Portuguese colony that declared independence in 1973, has Bissau as its capital and cashew nuts as its main export. GNB is the alpha-3 code.
Example: Cashew exports from GW account for most of the country's foreign earnings.
The Bijagós Archipelago off the coast is a UNESCO biosphere reserve. The alpha-3 code is GNB.
Related abbreviations
More engineering unit abbreviations
- GHz – Gigahertz
- GPa – Gigapascal
- gph – Gallons per hour
- gpm – Gallons per minute
- GWh – Gigawatt-hour
- hp – Horsepower
- hPa – Hectopascal
- HRC – Rockwell hardness C (scale)
See all 103 engineering unit abbreviations →