cloud seeding doesn't work
8Carl Feynman
4Radford Neal
New Comment
There’s two kinds of “work” here. One is to induce rain that would not have otherwise occurred, and the other is to induce rain that would have naturally occurred a few minutes or a few kilometers away. Call it “making” versus “moving” rain. A cursory examination of Wikipedia suggests the recent claimed successes have been at moving rather than making rain. And the failures at finding any effects have been at making rather than moving. And of course it would be far more useful to make rain than to move it.
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1In Alberta in the 1970s, there was a cloud seeding program whose aim was not to produce rain, but rather to reduce hail (which can be very damaging to crops, as well as property). It was viewed as experimental, with researchers doing surveys about how much hail fell. I don't know whether it worked or not, but I don't think one can come to any firm conclusion about it on the basis of simple observations such as "clouds are opaque".
But whether it works or not, it seems it's still actively done in Alberta: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/alberta/article-how-albertas-hail-suppression-project-helps-manage-severe-weather/