The United Arab Emirates seems to have the solution to solve the shortage of rain in a large part of its territory. Especially in Dubai, where they barely accumulate 100 mm of rainfall a year. The country's National Meteorology Center has spent months developing a project with drones capable of releasing electrical discharges in the clouds and that can drop the rain.
Maarten Ambaum, a professor at the University of Reading (United Kingdom) and one of the members of the project, assures that the plan is “ to persuade the water droplets to merge and stick together “. In this way, they will be large enough to fall to the surface. The mission of the drones, which have been modified and equipped with “custom electric charge emission instruments and sensors”, is to fly at a low altitude over Dubai and other areas and “to release small electrical discharges between the molecules of the air” , as mentioned by Alya Al-Mazroui, director of the research program for rain improvement in UAE, to ARAB News.
This practice carried out in Dubai seems to be a better alternative to spraying chemicals on clouds. In China, for example, they use aircraft equipped with a combustion chamber . This is dedicated to burning solid fuel to generate silver iodide, which in turn increases the number of suspended particles and comes into contact with the components of the clouds to promote precipitation.
The budget of the United Arab Emirates to cause artificial rain in Dubai and other parts of the territory
This is not the only “rain release” project being carried out by the Middle Eastern country. Another common practice is the dispersion of salt in the clouds, which increase the formation of droplets. The government of the United Arab Emirates, in fact, has a budget of 18 million dollars to solve the problem of low rainfall . In addition, in Dubai, a multitude of operations have already been carried out to make it rain in areas where the temperature reaches 40 degrees.
Now, can you get it to rain with this system? The multiple videos shared by the Instagram account of the United Arab Emirates National Meteorological Agency show that it is possible. In fact, the conditions are usually optimal, given that there are always many clouds in the territory. Interestingly, many of the rain seeding tests led administrations to issue alerts to the citizens of Dubai due to the high rainfall.
