Cloud seeding company that seeded clouds 2 days before the Texas floods says that it did not cause the storms

LudicrousSpeedGO!

LudicrousSpeedGO!

Active member
We often think that we know the strings that we are pulling when we inject things into complex systems (Earth, climate, our bodies, etc.) but often we don't foresee or understand the secondary/tertiary/etc. impacts. I'm not saying that this had influence on the 100-to-500-year storm event, but it needs to be investigated further. It's a little too coincidental that seeding operations occurred just 2 days prior to the tragedy for there not to be a thorough and scientific investigation. And it gives me less confidence that the AP is immediately coming out and emphatically stating that there is no correlation. We've learned through covid that quick "fact check" denials often turn out to shutting down discussion on matters which need further study (if not outright attempts at silencing the truth).

apnews.com

FACT FOCUS: No, weather modification did not cause the deadly flash floods in Texas

This is false. It is not possible that cloud seeding generated the floods, according to experts, as the process can only produce limited precipitation using clouds that already exist.
apnews.com apnews.com
 
I’ve read that cloud seeding has been used since the 1940’s. If it’s accurate that cloud seeding has been utilized that long then why are there still droughts? What is the purpose of it if the effectiveness seems so low?
 
interrobang said:
It was a remnant from a hurricane, not cloud seeding.
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Again, I'm not saying that this had influence on the 100-to-500-year storm event, but it needs to be investigated further.

Read a little more about the process. Here are some excerpts from the site below:

Possible environmental impacts include changes in precipitation patterns, alterations to hydrological cycles, and disruptions to natural habitats.

How should the benefits and risks of cloud seeding be distributed among different communities and stakeholders, particularly in regions prone to water scarcity or extreme weather events?

While some studies suggest that cloud seeding can enhance precipitation under certain conditions, others question its efficacy and reliability. Factors such as cloud type, seeding agent, atmospheric conditions, and geographic location all play a role in determining the success of cloud seeding operations.

Cloud seeding has been the subject of numerous controversies and debates. Critics argue that the scientific evidence supporting cloud seeding is inconclusive and that the potential risks outweigh the benefits. Skeptics raise concerns about unintended consequences, such as the displacement of precipitation, the introduction of pollutants into the environment, and the ethical implications of manipulating natural weather systems.

The science behind it: Cloud seeding operates on the principles of cloud physics and nucleation. Clouds consist of tiny water droplets or ice crystals suspended in the atmosphere. By introducing seeding agents into clouds, scientists aim to stimulate the formation of larger water droplets or ice crystals, which can grow and coalesce into precipitation particles. This process can enhance rainfall or snowfall rates, potentially increasing water resources in regions experiencing water scarcity.

Delivery Mechanisms: Cloud seeding operations rely on specialized delivery mechanisms to disperse seeding agents into target clouds effectively. These mechanisms include:
  • Ground-based generators: Stationary devices that emit seeding agents into the atmosphere, often positioned in strategic locations to target passing clouds.
weathergeeks.org

Cloud Seeding: What You Need to Know - Weather Geeks

Explore cloud seeding: its methods, controversies, and future. Learn about environmental impacts, stakeholder perspectives, and ethical considerations.
weathergeeks.org weathergeeks.org

So, let's think through a potential mechanism whereby a remnant from a hurricane can create a 100- to 500- year flood event by enhanced rainfall rates from recent cloud seeding. The seeding occurred 2 days prior to the flooding. Therefore, it is highly that the seeding material was still nearly all localized in the region where the hurricane remnant dumped 100- to 500- year rainfall event totals.

The research indicates that a criticism of cloud seeding is the seeding material is introduced into the environment as a pollutant. It is highly likely that it remained in the area of seeding and on the very top of the soil. The research further indicates that ground-based generators emitting seeding agents into the atmosphere are often positioned to target passing clouds. Wouldn't a remnant of a hurricane have the wind power to lift the seeding agents to the clouds in a very similar mechanism to ground-based generators? Wouldn't the seeding agent on the very top of the soil from seeding just 2 days prior have the potential to be easily lifted into the atmosphere with high winds? Wouldn't the seeding of hurricane remnant clouds result in enhanced rainfall rates as the research has shown?

My contention is that we need to further research whether seeding materials likely highly localized and on top of the soil from seeding 2 days prior were lifted into the atmosphere by a hurricane remnant with higher-than-normal winds similar to the ground-based generator method employed to seed the clouds thereby reseeding the hurricane remnants and exacerbating the rainfall rate to 100- to 500- year rainfall event rates.

As a physicist, I can tell you that the proposed mechanism above is possible. Further research is needed to understand if there was any correlation between the recent cloud seeding and the 100- to 500- year rainfall rate.
 
jjw165 said:
I’ve read that cloud seeding has been used since the 1940’s. If it’s accurate that cloud seeding has been utilized that long then why are there still droughts? What is the purpose of it if the effectiveness seems so low?
Click to expand...
Methods improve over an 85-year period for nearly everything that humans endeavor.
 
LudicrousSpeedGO! said:
We often think that we know the strings that we are pulling when we inject things into complex systems (Earth, climate, our bodies, etc.) but often we don't foresee or understand the secondary/tertiary/etc. impacts. I'm not saying that this had influence on the 100-to-500-year storm event, but it needs to be investigated further. It's a little too coincidental that seeding operations occurred just 2 days prior to the tragedy for there not to be a thorough and scientific investigation. And it gives me less confidence that the AP is immediately coming out and emphatically stating that there is no correlation. We've learned through covid that quick "fact check" denials often turn out to shutting down discussion on matters which need further study (if not outright attempts at silencing the truth).

apnews.com

FACT FOCUS: No, weather modification did not cause the deadly flash floods in Texas

This is false. It is not possible that cloud seeding generated the floods, according to experts, as the process can only produce limited precipitation using clouds that already exist.
apnews.com apnews.com
Click to expand...

This is when you lie to us and try to tell us you are/were a scientist, to futilely try to make your awful take not look as bad.
 
AnyNameYouWish said:
This is when you lie to us and try to tell us you are/were a scientist, to futilely try to make your awful take not look as bad.
Click to expand...
You are welcome to argue against the mechanism that I described which is fully supported by the current research on cloud seeding. Again, I am merely saying that further research is necessary and a correlation between the seeding and enhanced rainfall rates is possible by the cloud seeding mechanism described. Why are you against further research?

@interrobang The meteorologist responding denying that there was an association uses very poor logic. His logic essentially concludes that despite cloud seeding enhancing the rainfall rates of existing clouds, the fact that the potential for flooding showing up in meteorologic models for this event prevents cloud seeding from enhancing that forecasted flood potential. That conclusion is illogical. Why does he believe that rainfall rates can be enhanced by cloud seeding but rainfall rates predicted at flood levels in meteorological models cannot have the rainfall rates enhanced further? What is magical about flood producing rainfall rates that they cannot be further enhanced to 100- to 500- year rainfall rates by cloud seeding?
 
jjw165 said:
That’s my point. Cloud seeding has been occurring for 85 years and the evidence is inconclusive if it’s effective?
Click to expand...
In science there is often competing research. Define effective. There are three general mechanism for seeding. There are many different seeding agents used. One seeding agent with aerial seeding may be more effective than another with ground-based generator seeding with a particular type of cloud and associated weather conditions.

There are many variables. What is the method of measurement? What percent enhancement of rainfall rate achieved is "effective" relative to non-seeding? How do experimenters control all of the variables except the seeding? It's not like we control the other weather conditions or can create multiple identical clouds, weather and geographical conditions, such that we can have a control non-seeded group and one or more experimental groups.
 
interrobang said:
It was a remnant from a hurricane, not cloud seeding.
Click to expand...

Dear god. Cloud seeding 2 days before would have either already reacted or moved on. And what the remnants of a tropical system bring is exponentially greater than what cloud seeding could accomplish. It's like comparing a magnitude 7 earthquake to a magnitude 3.
 
DJ Spanky said:
Dear god. Cloud seeding 2 days before would have either already reacted or moved on. And what the remnants of a tropical system bring is exponentially greater than what cloud seeding could accomplish. It's like comparing a magnitude 7 earthquake to a magnitude 3.
Click to expand...
It is not a mutually exclusive thing, either remnant of hurricane or cloud seeding. Life is not always simple and binary. The question is whether cloud seeding material re-entered the atmosphere with the winds of a hurricane remnant and artificially increased the rainfall rate of the remnant of the hurricane. Cloud seeding has been shown to increase rainfall rates. Do you think it is a good idea to cloud seed a hurricane?

What is proposed is that there is a potential for cloud seeding material which is deposited on the top of the soil after several iterations of cloud seeding operations to re-enter the atmosphere and cloud seed again. This is very similar to an actual mechanism used for cloud seeding operations called ground-based generation. The only difference is that higher than usual winds (such as in a hurricane remnant) would be required to lift the cloud seeding material back into the atmosphere from on top of the ground where it was deposited from previous cloud seeding operations (this is a common criticism of cloud seeding that the cloud seeding material gets deposited on the ground below and is an environmental pollutant) whereas in ground-based generation, they use a machine to blow the cloud seeding material into the atmosphere. Otherwise, this is the exact same mechanism with the exact same cloud seeding material (more actually because there would have been cloud seeding material deposited on the ground from a number of rounds of cloud seeding which was the case in this area).

Why are many opposed to scientific study of this question? We could actually learn something. Instead, people are using failed logic that further cloud seeding an already high rainfall producing storm cannot increase rainfall rates in spite of the fact that cloud seeding operations are used to increase rainfall rates of lesser rainfall producing storms to increase those rainfall rates. Is there some magical rainfall rate that once achieved, seeding has no effect on it, but all other storms of lesser rainfall rates are affected?
 
DJ Spanky said:
Tin Foil Hats! Get your Tin Foil Hats here!!!
Click to expand...
It's no different than during covid those who understand science and can apply logic, reason, and critical thinking merely asked questions and sought further scientific study while lemmings simply followed what their media told them. Again, I don't say that the multiple iterations of cloud seeding operations leading up to the storm caused a hurricane remnant to become a 100- to 500- year rainfall event. I say that it warrants further study to determine if those cloud seeding materials re-entered the atmosphere increasing the rainfall rate as they do for most other storms for which they are intended.

As a scientist, I continue to question. This is the essence of science. You apparently shut up and do as you are told, exactly as you are told. No questions. No critical thought. Just do as you are told.
 
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