Wyoming's $8.8 million cloud-seeding experiment is drawing big-time attention

The Casper Star-Tribune reports:

The Wyoming project isn't the biggest cloud-seeding operation in the world. But, scientifically, it just may be the most important. Boe is one of several scientists working on the five-year Wyoming Weather Modification Pilot Project, an $8.8 million research program funded by the state of Wyoming. The project's scientists, along with state water managers, hope to find proof of whether the decades-old practice of seeding clouds -- trying to squeeze more precipitation out of passing storms -- actually works and that it's a practical option for increasing the state's water supply. Members of the world's science community -- cloud-seeing advocates and skeptics alike -- are watching the project closely. "For a scientist doing research, this is it. As far as in terms of the research, it is the biggest in the United States by far," Boe said. The Wyoming project is in its fourth year, only the second winter in which cloud seeding in earnest has actually been performed. The first two years involved mostly taking measurements and weather readings, obtaining permits from the U.S. Forest Service, gathering other statistical data and getting equipment in place. Cloud-seeding scientists estimate that, if done properly, pumping silver iodide into a cloud will increase snowfall in most cases by about 10 to 15 percent. That's roughly the same percentage of natural variability possible in normal weather patterns....