Showing posts with label weather-modification. Show all posts
Showing posts with label weather-modification. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Large Scale Food Shortages In The US Starting With Produce Now
Food in China: Weather, Wheat and Worry
Posted by KRISTA MAHR Tuesday, February 15, 2011 at 3:18 am
Submit a Comment • Related Topics: china, food, weather , drought, fao, food prices, wheat
China is a nation of superlatives, and its role in weather manipulation is no exception. Beijing runs the world's largest program in cloud seeding – the process of imbuing clouds with silver iodide to generate precipitation, usually in times of drought. China rolled out its cloud seeding technology to clear the skies of dust and pollution before the Beijing Olympics; last week, the rocket launchers and aircraft were mobilized again – this time to battle a drought in the nation's wheat belt.
Evidently, the world's biggest cloud seeding program just got bigger. Yesterday, China's meteorological agency announced that it had received over $1 million from the Ministry of Finance to improve its anti-drought work in rainmaking. Though Beijing's enthusiasm for the technology has been known to go astray, last week's efforts are credited with bringing at least some new snow and moisture to parts of the dessicated region.
For many around the world nervously watching China's wheat crop, that's good news. As the world's largest wheat producer, China is self-sufficient in wheat, but if this year's harvests don't deliver, there is a possibility that Beijing could burn through its significant reserves and have to start importing wheat, driving global prices up even further. (Yesterday, pushed up by floods in Australia and an earlier drought in Russia, wheat prices reached their highest mark since the 2008 record prices.)
How seriously the possibility of large-scale imports in China should be taken has been the subject of much debate in the last few days. Last week, the United Nation's Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) released a report (the first of its kind on China in 15 years) that the drought in the north, which has been going strong since fall, has affected about up to 60% of the nation's wheat crop. The report reads:
According to official estimates some 5.16 million hectares out of the total of about 14 million hectares under winter wheat may have been affected in these provinces. The drought has reportedly affected some 2.57 million people and 2.79 million livestock due to the shortages of drinking water.
It goes on to say that domestic wheat prices are up 16% over last year, and if the dry weather persists through the spring to affect the next harvest late this year, it could seriously impact global wheat prices.
Chinese officials predictably downplayed the report, estimating that the drought-affected area is closer to 40% — not 60 — and rightly underscoring the fact that the FAO report still predicts that China's wheat output would remain steady at 112 million tons. The FT's Javier Blas also called the UN body alarmist for jumping the gun at a sensitive time: “As the FAO tries to pick up the ball – under huge pressure from the French presidency of the G20 to improve its crop forecasting – it risks creating problems. With global agricultural markets on edge, the world is looking at the FAO for guidance. It needs timely and accurate information, but also nuance and perspective.”
Though trying to stamp out any sense of panic, Beijing itself has not exactly been blasé about the current state of affairs. China's winter wheat crop, harvested in June, yields over 90% of the nation's supply. Over the weekend, China's own drought control agency posted that continuing conditions were “grim” and called for emergency irrigation measures in the wheat belt, according to the New York Times. In addition to its hefty new cloud seeding investment, the government also handed out subsidies this fall to help farmers improve irrigation ditches and reservoirs in the wheat belt. A report from state-run daily Xinhua notes today that if all else fails and no rain comes through this winter or spring, "thousands" of wells could supply water.
Which sounds like a lot, but in the land of superlatives, it ain't. Nor will it be very comforting for the wheat farmers — or the global markets — if the weather doesn't break before the next planting this summer. So let's hope for rain.
Read more: http://ecocentric.blogs.time.com/2011/02/15/food-in-china-weather-wheat-and-worry/#ixzz1E37CT0bq
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Another Midwest Storm? Wow!
Plains and South brace for another winter storm
February 8, 2011 9:45 p.m. EST
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- Snow forecast from the Rockies into the mid-South by Wednesday
- Much of Oklahoma is under a winter storm warning
- The latest storm follows last week's historic weather system
Read more about this story from CNN affiliate KPRC. Share your photos and videos with CNN and tell us how you're handling the cold.
(CNN) -- Snow began falling over Colorado and Kansas on Tuesday as yet another round of winter weather began marching across the United States barely a week after a record-setting winter storm roared across the Midwest.
A powerful weather system poised over the Rockies is forecast to dump several feet of snow in the Mountain West and up to 10 inches in some parts of Oklahoma, forecasters said.
Much of Oklahoma is under a winter storm warning, but snow and sleet are predicted as far south as central Texas, with 2 to 4 inches expected to coat the Dallas-Fort Worth area, the National Weather Service said.
Later in the week, the system is expected to bring rain and snow to many areas of the Deep South before delivering a wintry mix along portions of the East Coast by Thursday.
Snow is expected to spread into Oklahoma and north Texas on Wednesday and into Wednesday night, said CNN meteorologist Dave Hennen. By Wednesday, it also will begin spreading into the Southeast. Cities like Memphis, Tennessee, and Little Rock, Arkansas, could see 4 to 8 inches of snow, while lesser amounts are expected in Nashville; Birmingham, Alabama; and Atlanta.
RELATED TOPICS
Bitterly cold temperatures will lock the center of the country in the deep freeze as the system moves east.
"Maximum temperature departures are expected to run 30 to 40 degrees below average for the central U.S. (Tuesday) with the same departures sinking south into Oklahoma and north Texas on Wednesday," the Weather Service said.
Rain is likely across most of the Southeast on Wednesday and Wednesday night.
Scattered snow is expected in the Great Lakes region Wednesday.
A historic storm left its mark on at least 30 states last week, dumping about 2 feet of snow on the Chicago area and prompting Oklahoma's governor to declare a state of emergency.
Another winter system at the end of the week left central and southern Texas a mess.
Ice caused 800 crashes across the Houston metropolitan area and many freeways were closed because they were too dangerous to navigate, CNN affiliate KPRC reported.
Hundreds of flights were canceled as the winter weather threatened the plans of Super Bowl enthusiasts headed for the game last Sunday in Arlington, Texas.
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Operation Popeye - Weather Warfare
Project Popeye (1966)
Project Popeye was an experiment in increased rainfall through cloud seeding jointly approved by the U.S. Department of State and U.S. Department of Defense. The technical aspects of the experiment were verified by Dr. Donald F. Hornig, Special Assistant to the President of the United States for Science and Technology. The government of Laos was not informed of the project, its methods or its goals.
Robert S. McNamara, U.S. Secretary of Defense, was aware that there might be objections raised by the international scientific community but said in a memo to the president that such objections had not in the past been a basis for prevention of military activities considered to be in the interests of U.S. national security.
During October 1966, Project Popeye was tested in a strip of the Laos panhandle east of the Bolovens Plateau in the Se Kong River valley. The test was conducted by personnel from the Naval Ordnance Test Station located at China Lake California. Fifty cloud seeding experiments were conducted with the result that 82% of the clouds produced rain within a brief period after having been seeded. It was claimed that one of the clouds drifted across the Vietnam border and dropped nine inches of rain on a US special forces camp over a four hour period. After the successful completion of the test phase, Project Popeye transitioned from an experiment to an operational program of the U.S. Defense department.
[edit]The Operation's Objectives
Operation Popeye goal was to increase rainfall in carefully selected areas to deny the Vietnamese enemy, namely military supply trucks, the use of roads by: [4]
- Softening road surfaces
- Causing landslides along roadways
- Washing out river crossings
- Maintain saturated soil conditions beyond the normal time span.
[edit]Operation Popeye
Starting on March 20, 1967 and continuing through every rainy season (March to November) in Southeast Asia until 1972, operational cloud seeding missions were flown. Three C-130 aircraft and two F4-C aircraft based at Udorn Royal Thai Air Force Base Thailand flew two sorties per day. The aircraft were officially on weather reconnaissance missions and the aircraft crews as part of their normal duty generated weather report information. The crews, all from the 54th Weather Reconnaissance Squadron, were rotated into the operation on a regular basis from Guam. Inside the squadron, the rainmaking operations were code-named "Motorpool".
The initial area of operations was the eastern half of the Laotian panhandle. On 11 July 1967, the operational area was increased northward to around the area of the 20th parallel and included portions of far western North Vietnam. In September 1967, the A Shau Valley in South Vietnam was added to the operational area. Operations over North Vietnam were eliminated on April 1, 1968 concurrent with conventional bombing restrictions being put into effect. The southern region of North Vietnam was added to the operational area on September 25, 1968 and then removed on November 1st of that year concurrent with a halt to conventional bombing of North Vietnam. In 1972, most of northeastern Cambodia was added to the operational area,
All rainmaking operations ceased on July 5, 1972.
[edit]The Operation revealed
Reporter Jack Anderson published a story in March 1971 concerning Operation Popeye (though in his column it was called Intermediary-Compatriot). The name Operation Popeye (Pop Eye) entered the public space through a brief mention in the Pentagon Papers [5] and a July 3 1972 article in the New York Times.[6] Operations in Laos ceased two days after the publication of the Times article.
The press stories led to demands from members of the U.S. Congress, led by Senator Claiborne Pell, for more information. U.S. House and Senate resolutions in favor of banning environmental warfare were passed as Senate Resolution 71 on July 11, 1973, H.R. 116 of 1974, H.R. 329 of 1974 and H.R. 28 of 1975.
[edit]Current Law and Operation Popeye
Weather modification procedures when performed to achieve a military end now fall under the provenance of the Convention on the Prohibition of Military or Any Other Hostile Use of Environmental Modification Techniques.
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