An expensive attempt at making it rain in Delhi through cloud seeding on Tuesday failed. The capital is yet to see a shower, and the poor air quality and the thick smog remain.
The planned second attempt, for Wednesday, was subsequently cancelled, IIT Kanpur announced. The reason given was “insufficient moisture in the clouds.”
The process of cloud seeding involves introducing Silver iodide particles to clouds, which modifies their structure and increases the chance of rain. Each attempt costs about Rs 55 lakh.
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IIT Kanpur Director Manindra Agarwal said the moisture content in the clouds was only 15-20% when Tuesday’s seeding efforts were made.
While speaking to NDTV, before the second attempt was cancelled, he said that the mixture used by the team has only 20% silver iodide and the rest was a combination of rock salt and common salt.
"There hasn't been any rain so far. So, in that sense, it was not completely successful. But, unfortunately, the clouds that are present today do not have very high moisture content. I am told it was only up to 15-20%. So, the possibility of causing rain with such low moisture content is not very high. But this trial has given more confidence to our team that we can continue conducting them," the director said.
While the attempt did not produce favorable results, the trial did provide some valuable insights.
The institute observed that Tuesday’s attempt did reduce major pollutants such as PM2.5 and PM10, The Hindustan Times reported.
A statement by the institution read, “Monitoring stations set up across Delhi captured real-time changes in particulate matter and moisture levels. The data shows a measurable reduction of 6 to 10 percent in PM2.5 and PM10 concentrations, indicating that even under limited moisture conditions, cloud seeding can contribute to improved air quality.”
The air in the national capital, however, remained in the “very poor’ and ‘poor’ categories in most places on Wednesday.
Wazirpur recorded the worst air quality once again, showing an AQI reading of 327, Wednesday morning.
A senior official at the Ministry of Earth Sciences said that the “Delhi government seems to have been misadvised about cloud seeding to be done in the post-monsoon, winter season. There will be no use of it as the season is dominated by western disturbances, making the seeding difficult in the absence of mature clouds.”