In the past few months, The UAE National Center of Meteorology (NCM) posted a series of Instagram photos and videos indicating rain alerts and showing torrential rain across several locations. The sight of swelling streams down the busy streets showered higher hopes for the UAE to battle the scorching July heat of 43°C and growing water scarcity with greater rain security. This recent rain is a cause of the drone cloud seeding project.
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is an arid region with very little rainfall and a sinking water table. The rising heat and water scarcity are becoming such a big issue that the UAE Government is now spending millions of dollars on scientists working on rain enhancement projects. A recent project is using drones to “cajole” clouds into producing rain! That’s right. The NCM is testing a new Cloud Seeding method, which involves flying drones into the clouds that will generate electric shock to encourage precipitation in the form of a rain shower.
UAE’s annual water consumption amounts to approximately 4 billion cubic meters. Just about 4% of the water has access to renewable resources. And annual rainfall is only an average of 100 mm, exposing the country to potential droughts.
Moreover, with the burgeoning population and a huge number of visitors, the water demand has surged manifolds. The UAE economy is not all about the global trade of oil anymore, the tourism industry also plays a pivotal role in the country’s annual GDP growth. And business travel is a big part of that, with more and more business channels opening up in the UAE. Recently in May 2021, the AGS DUBAI Conference attracted 4,500 attendees to the Intercontinental Dubai Festival City. Global iGaming company Vulcan Vegas also participated in the event. The lifestyle and opulence of the city are also world-class, with streets filled with designer shops and posh restaurants and bars and bustling beach life.
For such a landscape, water scarcity can pose a long-term economic threat. It is high time for the UAE Government to prioritize rain enhancement projects.
Cloud-seeding has been used in UAE as a successful rain enhancement method for quite some time. While the first cloud-seeding process began in 2010, the UAE Cloud-Seeding Program started developing way back in the 1990s.
In 2015, the United Arab Emirates Ministry of Presidential Affairs launched the United Arab Emirates Research Program for Rain Enhancement Science under the patronage of Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Presidential Affairs, Sheikh Mansour. The Research Program is now managed by the UAE National Center of Meteorology & Seismology. The goal of this grant program is to encourage and implement global research initiatives for rain enhancement and inspire additional investments in research funding and partnerships for better rainfall and water security across the world. Scientists from all over the world have led research teams working on these projects.
Since 2017, the UAE Government has funded nine different rain-enhancement projects and spent a total of $15 Million. Till now, UAE’s cloud seeding operations primarily used salt particles being dropped into the clouds to increase precipitation. By the first quarter of 2020, 200 such cloud seeding operations were carried out across UAE. Not only did it work but also resulted in flooding.
This particular method involves dispersing cloud-seeding chemicals or salt particles via aircraft or by firing dispersion devices like canisters or generators from the ground with specially designed rockets or anti-aircraft guns.
But scientists have raised concerns about the environmental impact, expense and overall efficiency of the method. New techniques and technologies are being tested, and the latest experiment is to fly drones into the clouds.
Prof. Eric W. Frew, from the University of Colorado Boulder, has been the Director of the Autonomous Systems Interdisciplinary Research Theme in the College of Engineering and Applied Sciences. He has been one of the three awardees of the Third Cycle of the UAE Research Program for Rain Enhancement Science. Prof. Frew’s project titled ‘Targeted Observation and Seeding Using Autonomous Unmanned Aircraft Systems’ has been a cutting-edge research project aiding the current innovation. The engineer aimed to build unmanned aircraft systems or automatic drones equipped with custom-made sensors capable of gathering in-situ, real-time data to sense and target suitable clouds for seeding.
Prof Maarten Ambaum, Head of the Meteorology Department at the University of Reading, also worked as a Director of the Rain-Enhancement Science-Research Program in UAE. According to him, even though the UAE doesn’t have sufficient rainfall, it does “have plenty of clouds.”
Prof Ambaum has explained the process of drone cloud seeding, as quoted in a BBC article, that the idea behind this technique is to persuade water droplets inside clouds to stick together. When the droplets come into contact with static electricity, they react “like dry hair to a comb.” As the drops merge and enlarge, it will eventually result in a downpour.
Reportedly, through the first quarter of 2021, some 126 cloud-seeding drones have been released. As of now, smaller drones are being released but based on the efficiency of this method, there may be greater funding available for developing larger aircraft in future to carry a greater payload of electricity in future, for a more efficient rain enhancement technique.
