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FOREWORD dation has recognized that independence of thought is an essen- tial component of policy oriented research, and for this reason has given the contractor complete freedom in determining the substantive content of the report. As the project drew to a close, interested ICAS agencies were given the opportunity to review the initial draft. Their comments were supplied to the contractor as a feedback mech- anism. Reviews made it clear to both the investigating team and the reviewers that inadequate attention had been paid to some aspects of the economic analysis. Consequently, a supple- mentary award was made in late 1971 to permit the rounding out and completion of the study. A final draft of that report was received in July, 1972. One of the consequences of review of that report was the judgment that the work was of sufficient sig- nificance that a more popular or lay version of the document should be prepared that would carry the central elements of the study in a more readable form to a wider range of public interest groups, concerned citizens, legislators, government officials and others who might find the technical document beyond their need or understanding. The preparation of that popular or lay version proved to be a more demanding task than either the contractor or the spon- soring agency realized. Four versions of that were prepared over a period of more than one year. The difficulty was in striking a balance between lucidity and brevity on the one hand and accuracy and completeness on the other. A final acceptable version was put forward in August, 1973. Each of these lay versions and the main report were reviewed by people not only with technical competence in the area, but with the editorial skill and perspective to evaluate its appropriateness for a more general audience. The delay in putting forward the complete technical report while awaiting the lay document was not a total loss of time, since the study team was available for and did conduct numer- ous briefings on the subject for professional, scientific and fed- eral government organizations. ix SNOWPACK, CLOUD-SEEDING, AND THE COLORADO RIVER assessment is likely to be bad news to someone. Consequently, that bad news as well as the good and indifferent news with re- gard to management of a particular technology must be brought forward in a way to inform the interested parties and illuminate the issues. In brief, quality control in the technology assessment must strike a balance between comprehensiveness, incisiveness, timelines, completeness, independence, and focus. The history of this particular project may interest both general readers and other organizations interested in sponsoring such assessments, and will assist them in understanding how these goals were approached. The study reported in this volume was initiated in J an- uary, 1971, in response to a request of July 15, 1970, from the Interdepartmental Committee for Atmospheric Sciences of the Federal Council for Science and Technology. They wished to explore the feasibility of applying technology assessment con- cepts to planned weather modification projects. The Bureau of Reclamation's proposal to augment the flow of the Colorado River by cloud seeding operations in the Upper Colorado River Basin was suggested by ICAS for the first technology assessment study, since a pilot experiment was already in progress in the San Juan Mountain Range and there was a need to provide the Secretary of the Interior and others with the necessary informa- tion to make the implementation decision. The National Science Foundation was requested to sponsor the study because it was already committed to the role of technology assessment under the RANN program and had no operational role to play with regard to the proposed project. The selection of the Stanford Research Institute to con- duct this technology assessment was made with the assistance of an ICAS committee based upon competitive proposals sub- mitted by eleven different organizations. The request for pro- posals (RFP-71-101) was issued on August 4, 1970. A pre- proposal conference was held on August 18, 1970. Proposals were received by September 9, 1970. The contract was funded and monitored by the National Science Foundation. The Foun- viii I~ l~ .~~td I 81