For as long as world have stand at the hands of the violent storm they have dreamed of ensure the conditions . The United States , like all swell empires lost to hubris , has long assay to manipulate the skies to its own ends . A new Federal report has revealedAmerica sucks at it .
The report comes from the Government Accountability Office ( GAO ) , a nonpartisan watchdog mathematical group that investigates the U.S. government . It ’s narrowly focused on “ swarm seeding , ” the practice of add together silver iodide crystals to swarm to make them bust and give up that sweetened sweet rain . As droughts hit the western states on a routine cornerstone , many local governments are attempting to use cloud seeding to impart the rains .
It ’s not working well . The GAO conceded there ’s some robustness to cloud seeding , but that it ’s almost insufferable to measure its effectiveness . “ Cloud seeding may increase urine accessibility and result in economical , environmental , and human wellness benefits . In the studies GAO reviewed , estimates of the additional precipitation lay out from 0 to 20 percent , ” the composition said . “ However , it is unmanageable to pass judgment the effects of cloud seeding due to limitations of effectuality research . ”

A technician fits canisters containing Silver Iodide, Sodium Chloride and Potassium Chloride onto a BQ-100 Beechcraft aircraft for the cloud seeding experiment project ‘Varshadhari’ at Jakkur Airport in the Indian city of Bangalore on 1 January 2025.© Photo credit should read MANJUNATH KIRAN/AFP via Getty Images
The idea of seeding cloud with something to make them rainwater started in the previous nineteenth C but was n’t study and perfected until after World War II . “ scientist demonstrated the basis of cloud seeding in the 1940s when they abide by in the laboratory that water present in clouds could be artificially cause to create icing crystals using juiceless ice or silver iodide lechatelierite , ” the GAO said in its account . “ panoptic Union funding of research and ontogeny , include field experimentation , followed this discovery . For example , in financial year 1978 , total federal funding for atmospheric condition modification was approximately $ 68 million , in 2024 dollar . ”
scientist could never quite try it worked . Or , if it did , how efficient the seeding was . In the eighties , the federal government activity thresh swarm seeding funds . These days , most cloud seeding schemes are local affairs . According to the GAO , nine states ( California , Colorado , Idaho , Nevada , New Mexico , North Dakota , Texas , Utah , and Wyoming ) are seeding the swarm .
Methods and specifics of seeding differ greatly between countries and even land . It can be done from an aircraft fly above or through a cloud system , or from a turgid carom on the priming that pump particulates into the breeze . It ’s often done with fluent iodide , but sodium chloride , ironic ice , liquid propane , and other salts are used too .

©GAO graphic.
The GAO report is a tilt of the limitations of the technical school . Utah alone is dumping $ 12 million a class into seed the clouds without too much to show for it . It ’s hard to estimate how much it would have rained without swarm seeding , so there ’s not a great agency to make a control group for any field . It ’s also intemperate to know how much the seeding affected rainfall in a specific area . Many old study of cum - establish rainfall demonstrate results that were n’t statistically significant .
“ While one subject area find an average increase in hurry of 3 percentage across 118 randomized case , this impression was not statistically distinct from zero , ” the GAO suppose . “ One study cover an medium precipitation increase of 3 percentage between 1977 and 2018 across nine vitrine , but the statistical results could not conclusively determine an effect from cloud seeding in seven of the cases . ”
The GAO also noted that no one have sex what pump fluent iodine crystal and other particulates into the clouds to generate rain does to flora and fauna on the undercoat . More water in dry areas is , generally , better . But change the water levels in delicate and complicated ecosystem can have unintended import . “ One stakeholder said it is not clear if cloud seeding could improve fish outcomes through high-pitched pee levels and humbled water temperature , and it is changeable how increased soil wet from cloud seeding might translate into healthier , less juiceless forests with deoxidise susceptibility to wildfires . ”

Silver iodine appears non - toxic in small doses , but the science is far from conciliate . “ Silver iodide is nearly insoluble in water , ” the account enjoin . “ However , when it dissolve it releases a pocket-sized telephone number of silvery ions . In high enough amount , silver ions — a known antimicrobic content — could have harmful effects on good bacteria in the environs and water resourcefulness . ”
The GAO also called out another job with cloud seeding programs : conspiracy theories . regime weather control has long been a feature film of cabal theories . It ’s a popular topic forAlex Jonesand hit prominence this year after Georgia GOP rep Marjorie Taylor Greene broadcast it around followingHurricane Helene .
This has lead some lawmakers to view cloud seeding as a threat . Tennessee lawmaker pass a broadsheet in April that shun all forms of cloud seeding in the body politic . In interviews with media , the Tennessee lawgiver allege they ’d taken the action toprevent chemtrailsin the skies . A ban on cloud seeding will do nothing to prevent chemtrails , which are just the plumes of condensation and fumes aircraft leave in their wake .

Chemtrailscloud seedingConspiracy Theorygeoengineering
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