This week the Chinese government announced that it plans to dramatically increase the use of geoclimatic technology that can artificially change the weather.
Climate control technology has been used in China for a long time. Things like cloud “seeding” (some call it bombardment), or systems that can launch silver molecules into the sky to stimulate cloud condensation and formation have been around for decades.
CNN reports today that China wants to increase the total size of its climate control and weather modification test area to 8 million square kilometers by 2025.
Climate control: a piece of the world with artificial weather
This is a gigantic increase. The area under climate control is larger than that of the whole of India. And it could affect the environment of the entire planet, producing positive consequences or conflicts.
In any case there is nothing in these intentions that we can predict with certainty.
Winds of war
In particular, China and India share a hotly contested border over which controversy has arisen more than once this year, according to CNN.
Indian agriculture relies on a monsoon season that has already become unpredictable due to climate change. A condition of uncertainty that is pushing the country's experts to worry that China could use its ability to control the climate (including rain and snowfall) as a real weapon.
“The lack of adequate coordination of climate control and weather modification activities (could) lead to accusations of “rain theft” between neighboring regions,” researchers from National Taiwan University concluded just 3 years ago in a paper published in Geoforum.
Global tampering
In the past, China has used its weather modification technology to sow clouds well in advance of major events such as the 2008 Olympics and political meetings, so that the events themselves would happen in clear skies.