Bomb the clouds with silver iodide to make it rain more?

2023-11-06 14:10:06

In the Sierra de Madrid, the Sierra de Guadarramait no longer snows like before and to make it happen again and have more water in the region, someone has come up with the idea of ​​bombarding the clouds with silver iodide.

The news is reported by the newspaper ABC: The Community of Madrid completes the bombardment of clouds in the mountains to cause snowfall. Thus we find out that the Isabel II Canal will request permission from Ministry of Environment to begin testing for “cloud seeding.”

As the aforementioned newspaper reports, it is an experiment, they are not sure what they are going to do. But what they are preparing is to fire a rocket from the ground with a type of shuttle that “should make contact with the cloud” at a height of between 1,300 and 1,500 meters. At that time, the missile would discharge the silver iodide.

If the experiment goes well, a chemical reaction would be triggered that would release hydrogen. This, in turn, when combined with the oxygen of the atmosphere, it would produce snow.

What can go wrong! Well, it is worth asking first about the effectiveness of this technology. In Nature Scientists have warned that There is little evidence on the effectiveness of this technique.

While several rigorous experiments have shown modest increases in precipitation, there is no evidence that it works every time.

What increases are we talking about? Well the HIM estimated that seeding clouds with small particles of silver iodide can increase precipitation by up to 15% in the right conditions.

Photo by Aleksandar Pasaric.

You may be wondering if this technique has any negative impact. Well, from ABC they try to reassure those of us who live in the Sierra de Guadarrama:

Will not have no negative environmental impact. Silver iodide is completely innocuous. In addition, the Canal water is treated in different phases, so its drinkability is guaranteed. “It would be about ‘lending a hand’ to the clouds that are located just above the mountains of the Madrid mountains.”

Of course, they tell us that this practice it is not harmful for humans, “as long as the established limits are respected.” In other spaces we can read that it is toxic, but that its toxicity to the environment is “negligible”.

The truth is that there are also studies carried out in Spain on anti-hail campaigns (which are also carried out with silver iodide) and “if they accumulate large quantities of planting materials in the environment”, silver iodide can affect “moderately” to the biota that lives in terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems.

But let’s see. The problem is not that a single toxic substance can reach our interior and that because a very small amount does so, we do not suffer any harm, no. The problem is that our interior already contains many everyday toxic substances, coming from food, environmental pollution, etc. And they are known to cause called “cocktail effect”.

When mixed, some toxins enhance their unwanted effects. Thus, various substances Below their legal limits can cause high damage. This is the cocktail effect. In this video, the journalist specialized in toxics, Charles of Pradaexplains it in a few words:

All this bombardment of clouds to obtain water raises some unknowns and problems:

-One of them is that it is not easy to measure the results of a cloud bombing operation and we may find that rains have been generated. without the need for rockets with silver iodide.

-And that behind technological problems there are also Social problems. That it never rains to everyone’s liking may be literal, since the bombarded clouds will offer rainfall to some that others will not enjoy.

-And as we have seen, there is the environmental issue and public health.

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