  We present an analysis of the accuracy of geometric albedos determined for
asteroids through the modeling of observed thermal infrared radiation. We show
that albedo uncertainty is dominated by the uncertainty on the measured $H_V$
absolute magnitude, and that any analysis using albedos in a statistical
application will also be dominated by this source of uncertainty. For all but
the small fraction of asteroids with a large amount of characterization data,
improved knowledge of the $H_V$ magnitude will be fundamentally limited by
incomplete phase curve coverage, incomplete light curve knowledge, and the
necessary conversion from the observed band to the $V$ band. Switching the
absolute magnitude standard to a different band such a $r'$ would mitigate the
uncertainty due to band conversion for many surveys, but this only represents a
small component of the total uncertainty. Therefore, techniques making use of
these albedos must ensure that their uncertainties are being properly accounted
for.
