Scientists share $5m bounty for rain enhancement projects

Professor Volker Wulfmeyer plans to modify Abu Dhabi's terrain in order to increase chances for rain.

Professor Volker Wulfmeyer from the Institute of Physics and Meteorology at the University of Hohenheim in Stuttgart, Germany, is going to modify Abu Dhabi's terrain in order to increase chances for rain.
According to him, mist, fog and sand storms, often encountered in Abu Dhabi, make it hard to locate clouds and, therefore, cloud seeding, which enhances the chances for rain, is not always successful.
"We have to observe the environment that leads to the formation of clouds, but in desert areas, this is very difficult because atmospheric conditions don't allow to spot the clouds. So, we need to modify the terrain first by planting vegetation, for example," he said.
By changing the terrain, clouds convergence would re-locate too, making it easier not just to spot, but also to "control" cloud seeding and thus, the rain itself.
"Translocating cloud convergence would result in better water management; it would let you know what time and what place the rain will fall," added Wulfmeyer.
Professor Wulfmeyer's project, which also involves the studying of zones where clouds form, was one of the three that won the first cycle of UAE Research Programme for Rain Enhancement Science.
The other two winners were Professor Masataka Murakami from the Institute for Space-Earth Environmental Research at Nagoya University, Japan, and Linda Zou, Professor of Chemical and Environmental Engineering at Abu Dhabi's Masdar Institute of Science and Technology.
Their three winning projects will share $5 million, which will help put in practice their scientific ideas. The three teams have now three years for study, research and trials.
It is exactly one year ago that the National Centre for Meteorology and Seismology (NCMS) announced the UAE Research Programme for Rain Enhancement Science at the 2015 Abu Dhabi Sustainability Week (ADSW).
As promised back then, the winners of the first cycle - two more cycles are going to be in 2017 and 2018 - were announced during ADSW 2016, on Tuesday night in Abu Dhabi.
"Today, 89 per cent of the global population live in desert or arid areas, and by 2030, 8.5 billion people will be affected by water scarcity," pointed out Dr Sultan bin Ahmed Sultan Al Jaber, UAE Minister of State and chairman of Masdar, which organises the ADSW.
"These are the reasons we started the Rain Enhancement programme," he added.
If the rain enhancement projects awarded by NCMS will be successful, these arid areas will get more rain, thus reducing the need for desalinated water and increasing agricultural yields.
"We will apply the rain enhancement projects in the UAE, but we will also make them available to the world for free," pointed out Dr Abdullah Al Mandoos, director of NCMS.
- silvia@khaleejtimes.com