A Ten Year Non-Randomized Cloud Seeding Program on the Kings River in California

Abstract

In 1954 a cloud seeding program designed to increase rainfall and snowpack was initiated over the water-shed of the Kings River in the Sierra Range of California. The project has been funded by the Kings River Conservation District, Fresno, California, and operated continuously each season during the 7-month October?April periods. At the end of the first three-year period, a multiple regression analysis was developed utilizing the unregulated historic flow of the Kings River and the flow of adjacent rivers presumed to be unaltered by cloud seeding activities. This statistical analysis has been applied to the flow of the rivers. During the ten-year seeded period 1954?1964, the analysis shows an apparent increase in flow amounting to 6 per cent of the total predicted by the recession analysis. This apparent increase is significant at the 0.005 level.