Idaho Reports (VIDEO): Cloud Seeding for Increased Snowpack, Runoff Water, Hydroelectric Power, Agriculture, and Recreation

This recent report on cloud seeding in Idaho does a good job explaining the basics of these programs and the motivation behind them.  Most cloud seeding in Idaho is done using ground based emitters that inject silver iodide particles into the atmosphere via mixing with a propane flame.  These plumes of silver iodide laden exhaust are emitted on the upwind flanks of mountains and hitch a ride up into the clouds on the natural orographic lifting of an air mass as it flows through the mountains.

Once aloft, these tiny particles of silver iodide serve as cloud condensation nuclei.  Eventually enough moisture sticks to the particles to fall as rain or snow. These programs are generally conducted at lower temperatures -- during the winter -- for the purposes of snowpack augmentation.

Idaho Power estimates a 15% increase in their winter snowpack due to these programs.  The science is still far from settled on how these programs impact atmospheric moisture and precipitation levels downwind of where cloud seeding takes place.

Cloud seeding with silver iodide is a relatively ancient technology developed in the 1940s by researchers at General Electric.  Much more advanced weather and climate modification technologies have been developed in the decades since.

Check out this video for more info on cloud seeding.  Peace.