Weather Modification Effort Continues
The cloud seeding effort to produce more rain will continue for at least another year, according to Dennis Seidenberger, the Glasscock County Underground Water Conservation District’s representative to the board of the West Texas Weather Modification Association. He said Glasscock County reaped a provable one-inch rainfall increase during the first part of 2004 due to cloud seeding.
Seidenberger said state funding is gone, and after this year, the GCUWCD will have to decide whether to continue to support the effort. He said, “We’re finally where we want to be to enhance rainfall, and it would be a shame to lose it now. What we’ll learn about modifying weather in the next five years will be tremendous.” But Seidenberger added, “If the majority in the county doesn’t want the weather modification program, we won’t have it.”
In June 2005, the district will probably have to decide whether to increase its assessment per acre or pull out of the program. The district currently spends approximately $27,000 per year, 20 percent of its total expenditures, on cloud seeding.