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Clouds and conspiracies: concerns over push to make rain

Countries worldwide have been engaging in cloud seeding, a practice invented in the 1940s, to induce rain or snow in specific areas using various techniques involving aircraft dispersal of particles, in response to climate change-driven floods and droughts.
Cloud seeding is employed globally to alleviate drought, combat forest fires, and disperse fog at airports, with China, one of the most prolific weather modifiers, initiating the Sky River project in 2018 to address water shortages and enhance food security.
Cloud seeding involves infusing clouds with silver iodide, which causes ice crystals to form and water to condense into rain or snow.
The 2019 World Meteorological Organization assessment found that cloud seeding increases precipitation between essentially zero and around 20 percent, while the American Meteorological Society has expressed concerns regarding the undetermined and potentially cross-border impacts of weather modification, leading Marine de Guglielmo Weber to warn, "If a country learns that its neighbour is changing the weather, it will be tempted to blame the neighbour to explain a drought."
Despite the 1976 UN convention prohibiting hostile use of environmental modification techniques, which some countries have not signed, and mixed research on the effectiveness of cloud seeding, the practice raises concerns about cross-border tensions, fake news, and potential harm, as Laura Kuhl stated in a 2022 article, emphasizing that there is "significant danger that cloud seeding may do more harm than good".

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Clouds and conspiracies: concerns over push to make rain

Can countries control the clouds? And should they? As climate change drives floods and drought, rainmaking is in fashion across the world, despite mixed evidence that it works and concerns it can stoke cross-border tensions.

3 days ago·United Kingdom

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Issuesfr

Clouds and Conspiracies: Concerns about raining thrust

Can countries control clouds? And should they? While climate change leads to floods and drought, rainmaking is fashionable around the world, despite mixed evidence that it works and concerns, it can fuel cross-border tensions. Although trying to control the weather can look like [...]

3 days ago

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Le Télégramme

Will the clouds become a weapon of war?

For decades, states have been manipulating these white masses suspended in the atmosphere, a practice that could create or fuel global geopolitical tensions with climate change.

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