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<br />NA WC cites its long history, which dates back to 1951, in conducting successful winter <br />orographic weather modification programs as evidence that the conduct of this project is <br />technically feasible. Attachment 1 provides a summary listing of some of NA WC's previous <br />operational precipitation enhancement projects. Many of these projects were winter orographic <br />weather modification projects. <br /> <br />7. Describe How the Proposed Proiect is Desilmed for and Offers Promise of <br />Expandinf! the Knowledf!e and Technolof!V of Weather Modification (aoplicable to <br />research oroiects onlv) <br /> <br />Not applicable, operational project is proposed. <br /> <br />8. Appraise the Risk that the Proposed Proiect Could Cause Substantial Harm to <br />Land. Water. People. Health. Safetv. Property and the Environment. <br /> <br />The Denver office of the Bureau of Reclamation conducted a number of research <br />programs in weather modification under their "Project Skywater" program. This program was <br />active from the 1960's to the 1990's. As part ofthis program, a number of environmental studies <br />were conducted. Results of some of these studies included: the Medicine Bow Ecology Project <br />(Knight, et aI, 1975), San Juan Ecology Project (Steinhoff and Ives, 1976), Uinta Ecology <br />Project (Harper, 1981), and the Sierra Ecology Project (Berg and Smith, 1980; Berg, 1988). The <br />potential impacts of artificial ice-nucleating agents (which included silver iodide) were <br />investigated by Klein, 1978. A technological assessment of winter snowpack augmentation in the <br />Upper Colorado River Basin was reported on by Weisbecker, 1974. <br />The American Society of Civil Engineers, Manual 81, Guidelines for Cloud Seeding to <br />Augment Precipitation (ASCE, 2006) contains a chapter entitled "Economic, Environmental, and <br />Societal Aspects of Precipitation Enhancement by Cloud Seeding. The following is a quote from <br />this report which summarizes the results of these research efforts, "The essence of the results is <br />that changes that might be expected in the environmental factors (i) were most often subtle, nil, <br />or indiscernible in relation to other natural influences (e.g., effects of fire or insects on forest <br />vegetation); (ii) would be of the same type and magnitude as would result from a sustained <br />increase of a corresponding percent in natural precipitation (e.g., as a gradual change in herb <br />species composition might occur in a wetter climate); might be beneficial as often as not and <br />depending on point of view (e.g., as when fish habitat increases with lake level); and (iv) would <br />have net incomes that strongly affect ecosystem management practices (e.g., as when increased <br />weed growth and grassland productivity occur together)". This report continues, "During the <br />1970's, the most common seeding agents, chemical complexes of silver iodide, were examined <br />for ecological effects (Copper and Jolly, 1970; Klein, 1978); conclusions from those studies <br />point to little or no effects on terrestrial or aquatic biological communities, either immediately or <br />after many, many years of silver or iodide application in the small dosages possible from cloud <br />seeding" . <br />In summary, no significant environmental impacts are expected from the conduct of the <br />Upper Gunnison River project. <br /> <br />8 <br /> <br />