The UAE has been using cloud seeding technology to influence rainfall since the 1990s. Cloud seeding involves tracking clouds and triggering them to release rain. But as threats of climate change and population growth come together in a country that experiences less than 100 mm of rainfall per year, fears about water scarcity are intensifying – and scientists at the UAE’s National Center of Meteorology (NCM) are leading the way in addressing them.
Specialised planes sow rain seeds
While some cloud seeding programmes use ground-based equipment, in the UAE operations entail specialised planes “flaring” seed agents (usually natural salts such as potassium chloride) into the lower part of clouds “that have favorable updrafts”, an NCM official explained for Al Arabyia. The salts are carried upward into the clouds, promoting condensation and coalescence. Essentially this “leads to the enlargement of droplet sizes, making them heavier”, the official added. And then it…