Sheri,
Your article neglected to mention a significant downside of diving with PST, Worthington, and Faber (and other) high pressure steel cylinders. A recreational, open water diver should be weighted such that, with a full cylinder and a completely empty BCD, he or she should be able to establish *positive* buoyancy at the surface by simply dropping his or her weight belt. However, when full, these high pressure steel cylinders are so negatively buoyant that a diver just might not be able to do thisespecially if he or she is wearing a thin, or no, wetsuit.
And, of course, this has obvious implications for recovering a non-responsive diver from depth, too.
Note: This is less of a concern when using the old steel USD (PST) 72's (71.2 cu ft at 2,250+10%=2,475 psig)especially when diving in salt water.
Safe Diving,
rx7diver
Propering weighting for neutral buoyancy is near empty tank, empty BCD, holding a full breath, you should float at eye level. Reasoning is that you will still have enough lead to maintain neutral buoyancy for a safety stop at the end of your dive and in an out of air emergency, you can establish positive buoyancy at the surface simply by adding one-breath of air to your BCD.
All things being MOL equal, you will use about 5 lbs less weight in your weight system (belt or integrated BCD) using a steel tank instead of an aluminum. As rx7diver pointed out, diving in warm water with little or no exposure suit, you may not need even 5 lbs of lead when diving an aluminum tank. In 80+ water temp, I dive using a 2mm shorty with an aluminum tank and only 2# of lead (lbs not kg). 10 years ago, and about 30 lbs of table muscle ago, I could dive a 3mm full suit without any lead when using an aluminum tank. I would have been a rock on the bottom with a steel tank.
In CA, I dive a drysuit, Stainless steel BP/WG with a steel 100. I use 4 lbs of lead on a weight belt. On colder days when I add my thermal vest in addition to my Bare SB Systems Mid-layer thermal, I might jump up to a 6 lbs belt