WMOD00481

• Title: Managing Snowpack Augmentation Research
• Weather Modification - Doc Type: Report

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All Skywater pr-ograms ar e coopera tive wi th the following features:

Local and state groups have planning and operational
advisory responsibilities.

Local and state groups work under contract with the
Service to perform research with Federal funds.

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Local and state legislatures share costs with the
Federal Government to conduct postions of research.

- Cooperating groups share data and analysis functions.

The distribution of FY 1980 obligations for Project Skywater shown in
Figure 3 illustrates the continuing policy of contracting the major por-
tion (73 percent) to universities, private firms, and other government
agencles.

FUTURE RESEARCH

Project Skywater's future winter orographic research will continue
with work in the Sierra Nevada and implementation of a major program in
the Colorado River Basin. -This approach is consistent with the Weather
Modification Advisory Board's recommendations.

"Because of regional differences in precipitation-producing
conditions in the Western United States, we recommend that
two experimental tests be conducted simultaneously--one,
largely exploratory, in the Sierra Nevada of California, and
the other, a sharply focused confirmatory program, in the
Colorado Rocky Mountains. The opportunity is available for
a major step toward obtaining the hard evidence needed for
this mode of cloud seeding, and this opportunity should be
promptly and vigorously pursued" (5).

An improved weather modification technology depends in part upon
the investment that society is ,.illing to make in further scientific
.':_"'~ learning. A11 equally important fac tor is the fOu ture development of
___ __-......- institutional arrangements to cope with the frequently conflicting needs
and desires of different sectors of our society. The best weather rnod-
ification technology is one that is both environmentally and socially
acceptable.

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Foehner