Weather Modification Law in the USA | Link
Summary of court cases and principles of tort liability for cloud seeding, including both drought or flood allegedly caused by cloud seeding
October 22, 2006 | This essay briefly reviews governmental regulation of weather modification, then concentrates on judicial opinions regarding modified weather or cloud seeding and suggests how future weather modification torts might be argued. The scope of this essay does not cover liability for inadvertant weather modificiation, such as:
- release of heat or smoke from industrial smokestacks;
- injection of water vapor and particulates from jet airplane engines into the dry stratosphere;
- release of heat and airborne particulates from cities;
- pollution from automobiles;
- global warming from release of CO2 by burning wood, coal, oil, or natural gas; or
- removal of ozone by release of fluorocarbons into the atmosphere
This essay also does not consider purely local weather modification, such as dissipating fog in supercooled clouds at an airport.
This essay was initially written to inform:
- potential plaintiffs (e.g., farmers, ranchers, and people who might be the victim of floods
- meteorology students, and
- attorneys and law students working in either environmental law or water law, about the nationwide law in the USA that affects tort liability for cloud seeding.
