Many countries realized that they could use cloud seeding to stop the rain too. If you look at the overall process, what are we doing here? We are speeding up the condensation process. We are trying to get the water droplets in the clouds to rain as soon as possible. So if on a specific day, in a specific area, we want to prevent rain then over the last several days cloud seeding needs to be carried out in the surrounding areas. That means the water droplets in the clouds would have already rained and there would be no more clouds. Thus, no rain for the few specified days.
This exact technique was used in 2008 by China during the Beijing Olympics. They wanted to avoid any rain during the opening ceremony so that there would be no problems. After this, in February 2009, China used iodide sticks when a drought in Beijing was expected. To counter that, they made snowfall in the Beijing area. It snowed for three days and they had to close 12 roads due to snowfall. And now they plan to revive the Yangtze River using this process. It won’t be easy to revive such a big river but with proper planning, it might be achievable.
Snow reminds us of the many ski resorts in the USA which use this process to ensure sufficient snowfall. Because ski resorts need reliable snowfall for people to ski. If there is no snowfall, the resorts will go out of business. So they use this process to artificially produce snow. These were direct uses of cloud seeding. Apart from this, did you know that cloud seeding can be used to reduce the size of hailstones.
So that they don’t cause heavy damage. Or the fog that we see, it can reduce the amount of fog, especially around airports, so that flights can stick to their schedule.
