Feasibility/Design Study for a Cloud Seeding Program in the Yadkin River Basin, North Carolina

Authors

  • Don Griffith North American Weather Consultants, Inc.
  • David Yorty North American Weather Consultants, Inc.
  • Walter Neal Simmons Cube Hydro Partners, LLC

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.54782/jwm.v51i1.717

Keywords:

Weather Modification Operations, Weaher Modification Feasibility Studies

Abstract

North American Weather Consultants (NAWC) was contracted by Cube Hydro Partners, LLC with headquarters in Bethesda, Maryland, to conduct a cloud seeding feasibility/design study for the Yadkin River Basin located in North Carolina. This study was prepared in conformance with American Society of Civil Engineer’s Guidelines and Standards. The goal of the program would be to augment precipitation over the Yadkin River Basin to increase streamflow into a series of Cube Hydro reservoirs along the Yadkin River. This increased streamflow would then be used to generate additional hydropower (clean energy) from facilities installed on project dams. NAWC compiled a site-specific climatology for this Basin. Both ground-based and airborne seeding was considered, but only airborne seeding was recommended due to the lack of significant topographic features in the Basin and the rather high average height of the -5° C level in potentially “seedable” storms (630 mb), as well as other meteorological factors. Regression equations relating precipitation to streamflow suggest that seeding only during the cool season produces streamflow increases not only during the cool season, but would also have a residual effect that increases streamflow throughout the remainder of the year. Overall, cool-season seeding is likely to have about 1.4 times as much impact on total streamflow as warm-season seeding (assuming the same increase percentage-wise in precipitation), with the cool season increase more evenly distributed throughout the year in terms of the resultant streamflow. Therefore, only a cool season program was recommended. Detailed examination of a 3-year cool season storm climatology in the Yadkin Basin suggest that aircraft-based cloud seeding during the cool season could enhance precipitation by 4.1%, resulting in an estimated 5.2% increase in annual streamflow (109,200 acre-feet). Cost estimates were prepared for a seasonal program. Once the estimated costs were established, NAWC was able to develop benefit/cost ratio estimates. Using information provided by Cube Hydro, NAWC calculated a potential benefit/cost ratio of 5/1. NAWC concluded that the proposed program was feasible based upon both technical and economic considerations as recommended in the “Guidelines for Cloud Seeding to Augment Precipitation”, Third Edition by the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE,2016).

Author Biography

  • Don Griffith, North American Weather Consultants, Inc.
    President, North American Weather Consultants, Inc.,  Sandy, UT

Downloads

Published

2020-01-29

Issue

Vol. 51 No. 1 (2019)

Section

Scientific Papers

License

Authors that submit papers for publication agree to the Journal’s copyright and publication terms. Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the manuscript’s authorship and initial publication in Journal of Weather Modification. Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal’s published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in the Journal of Weather Modification. Authors are permitted to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process to encourage productive exchanges and greater citation of the published article.
 
Articles are published online using restricted access for the first year. After the first year, articles are made freely available online. Immediate open access for an article may be obtained by the author paying an open access fee which is in addition to the normal page changes. Authors are expected to honor a page charge in order to support publication and distribution of the journal. After the author approves the gallery formatted version for publication, the Weather Modification Association’s Secretary will invoice the corresponding author for the page charges and payment is due within 30 days.

How to Cite

Feasibility/Design Study for a Cloud Seeding Program in the Yadkin River Basin, North Carolina. (2020). The Journal of Weather Modification, 51(1). https://doi.org/10.54782/jwm.v51i1.717