The Rationael for Future Weather Modification Research

Abstract

A new national effort dealing with planned and inadvertent weather modification has been recommended. The contention is that this readiness stems from finally learning important facts about how to properly design and conduct difficult experimentations; the need to study and understand ever growing inadvertent weather modification; the development of complex instrumentation and growing expertise; and more awareness of the impacts of changing the weather. Most importantly, awareness has come that progress can be made only through great attention to resolving many of the complex unknowns in the areas of cloud physics and dynamics. The potential benefits of an uncertain technology are difficult to specify, but appear sufficient to justify the research and development costs many have recommended. Either a better research program should be developed or we should essentially stop weather modification research.