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ALAN BIBLE I believe a meaningful step in the right direction was a resolution I co-sponsored which urged the President to undertake a preliminary study aimed at establishing the feasibility of these project proposals. It may well be the Colorado will benefit from weather modification studies and saline water conversion long before interbasin transfers become a reality. This may strike some observers as extra- ordinary. There remains a tendency .on the part of the general public to view rainmaking as something of an occult art, and the possibilities of water conversion have yet to fire the imagination of the aver- age American. Yet, as you and I know, the possibilities are enormous, and I would like to take a moment to examine them. It has been estimated that 75 percent of the potential precipitation for the Colorado River never actually falls on the watershed. In other words, the Colorado only realizes one fourth of the po- tential from 10 or more major storms each year, because the efficiency of cloud precipitation during these storms is not good. A statistic like this underscores the importance of weather modification research. It is an area in which I have been eager to playa role, because I feel it may one day become one of our most val- uable sources of fresh water. Some of you may recall that in 1957 I conducted Senate hearings on the first major weather modification program, and since then I have supported efforts to widen research and implement the knowledge we have gained. . I think it's important that we all remember that the science of weather modification is stiJI in its infancy. There is a great deal more to be learned and a' great deal more to be done before we can start talking seriously about tapping our "rivers in the sky" with any basis in fact. But the rewards of this program, when successfully implemented, will be enormous. For ex- ample, it is estimated that an additional $30 million in water and power revenues would be realized from just one inch of rain in the Upper Colorado Basin, based on a runoff of 575,000 acre-feet. This is the reason I testified before a Senate Interior Subcommittee in favor of an increase over the $5 million requested by the Bureau of Reclamation for weather modification research in fiscal 1968. I believe the Reclamation activities should be assigned the highest priority, particularly since the 89th Congress rejected a bill to establish a comprehen~ive weather modification effort. Research in atmospheric water potential has now progressed to a point where the Bureau of Reclamation anticipates firm results by the mid 1970's. Reclamation Commissioner Floyd Dominy predicted recently that his agency will at that time be able to demonstrate the ability to increase by 15 percent the November through April precipitation of certain areas in the Colorado River Basin Watershed. These areas would include 14,200 square miles above 9,500 feet elevation. Reclamation authorities expect to establish a seeding program by 1975 or 1976 on the high reaches of the Green, San Juan, Gunnison, Colorado and lesser drainage areas of the basin. They esti- mate the average annual runoff can be increased by nearly two million acre-feet a year as a result. And this would be inexpensive water - - - $1.50 to $2.00 per acre-foot. Additional benefits to non-consum- ing users would be about $20 miJIion to $25 million annually. No less exciting is the promise held forth by saline' water conversion. I have long been a cham- pion of this program at the federal level, and in 1961 and .1962 I joined in sponsorship of bills to sub- stitute action for talk in starting desalinization research. Under a research and development program approved in 1961, four demonstration plants were opened. Since then, we have come a long way, and the Con*ress this year elected to extend and expand , . -8-