Playing God with the Weather – A Disastrous Forecast

Government Efficiency, Financial Management and Intergovernmental Relations

2025-09-16

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Source: Congress.gov

Summary

This meeting of the Subcommittee on Delivering on Government Efficiency addressed the complex topics of weather modification and geoengineering, featuring diverse perspectives from witnesses and members of Congress.[ 00:21:07 ]

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 The discussion covered historical practices, potential risks, and the overarching debate surrounding climate change and governmental responsibilities.[ 00:22:07 ]

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Themes

Definitions and Scope of Weather Modification and Geoengineering

The hearing aimed to distinguish between weather modification, typically localized efforts like cloud seeding, and geoengineering, which seeks to alter the climate system on a planetary scale to address climate change. Cloud seeding, using substances such as silver or lead iodide or dry ice, has been practiced for decades, but its effectiveness remains largely unknown or inconclusive, especially beyond small local scales.[ 00:22:55 ]

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 Geoengineering methods discussed included removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and solar radiation modification (SRM), such as stratospheric aerosol injection, which aims to block sunlight. While the federal government's direct involvement in weather modification has declined since the 1970s, state and private sector activities continue.

Concerns and Risks of Weather Modification and Geoengineering

Significant concerns were raised regarding the potential for unknown and unintended consequences from both weather modification and geoengineering practices. Specific risks highlighted included reductions in crop yields, adverse impacts on plant and animal life, ozone depletion, human health damage, and the accumulation of substances like silver iodide in soil and water. Ethical questions about who controls global climate interventions and the potential for weaponizing weather were also discussed. Members emphasized the public's right to transparency and information from the government on these topics, contrasting it with past dismissals of concerns as "baseless conspiracies." Historical events like Project Cirrus, where a hurricane's path changed after seeding, were cited to illustrate liability issues and the unpredictable nature of such interventions.

Climate Change and Policy Debates

A core division emerged between those who view climate change as a "hoax" or question the extent of human influence, and those who assert a clear scientific consensus on human-caused global warming and its urgent impacts.[ 00:23:30 ]

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 Debates included the role of carbon dioxide, the accuracy of climate models, and the reliability of past predictions regarding sea levels and ice caps. The Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) role in regulating pollution, including carbon emissions, was central to the policy discussion, with some criticizing actions that dismantle environmental protections and defund research.[ 00:31:18 ]

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 Calls were made for international cooperation and regulation of geoengineering, akin to nuclear non-proliferation treaties, to address global implications.

Government Oversight and Transparency

Recommendations for improved government oversight included enacting legislation to clarify the effectiveness of weather modification, standardizing federal law, and requesting assessments from the National Academy of Sciences. The importance of transparent reporting on weather modification activities and monitoring the atmosphere for compliance with potential bans was emphasized. Concerns were raised about the lack of robust regulation for companies engaged in cloud seeding, particularly regarding undisclosed chemical agents. Members highlighted the importance of federal science funding and non-partisan civil servants for addressing climate-related challenges and ensuring societal resilience.[ 01:07:34 ]

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Tone of the Meeting

The meeting exhibited a contentious and polarized tone, marked by significant ideological disagreements on climate change and the appropriate government response.[ 01:25:38 ]

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 Some members and witnesses expressed skepticism and concern about the efficacy and potential dangers of weather modification and geoengineering, framing interventions as playing "God with the weather" and potentially making people "lab rats." Conversely, others conveyed urgency and alarm regarding human-caused climate change, advocating for robust climate action and defending scientific consensus against "anti-science theories" and "climate denialism." The discussion also contained informative and educational elements, as witnesses explained scientific concepts and historical context. At times, the tone became accusatory and critical, with members questioning the motives and integrity of opposing viewpoints and previous administrations.

Participants

Transcript

This hearing of the Subcommittee on Delivering on Government Efficiency will come to order.  Welcome, everyone.  Without objection, the chair may declare recess at any time.  I recognize myself for the purpose of making an opening statement.  Good morning and welcome to today's hearing.  I would like to first ask for a moment of silence to pray for Charlie Kirk, his wife Erica, and their children.   Thank you.  Humans have been trying to control the weather for centuries.  Native American tribes perform ceremonial dances to summon rain during droughts.  The Mayans sacrifice humans to their rain god.  Today, people are still trying to control the weather, but some things have changed.   Modern attempts at weather control don't appeal to divinity, instead they use technology to put chemicals in the sky.  Cloud seeding, for instance, uses silver or lead iodide to try to increase rainfall in a specific location.   What's also changed over time is the scale of ambition.  Today's advocates of geoengineering don't just want to address droughts or improve conditions for agriculture.  They want to control the Earth's climate to address the fake climate change hoax and head off global warming.  That, of course, requires massive interventions.  What methods do they use?   One is to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.  Yes, the same carbon dioxide that keeps plants alive and prevents mass starvation.  Another method they want to use is to block the rays of the sun from hitting the Earth.  You heard that right.  Yes, the same sun that makes all life possible on Earth.
Some scientists think they can predict and control the impact of geoengineering, but even the best scientific models will never be able to capture all of God's wonderful creation and nature's mysteries.   So we can predict the real impacts these global scale interventions would have little better than the Native Americans could know the impact of their rain dances.  And we are not talking about experiments that take place within the four walls of a laboratory.  Our world is the laboratory.  And we happen to be the lab rats.  Blocking the sun would have unknown consequences that no scientific climate model could ever reliably predict.   This could include serious reductions in crop yields, significant changes in plant and animal life, disastrous ozone depletion, not to mention the damage done to human health.  The reality is that the federal government has a long history of experimenting with weather modification.   That includes a 1947 attempt by the military and General Electric to intercept a hurricane off the coast of Jacksonville, Florida.  It includes an event in the 50s and 60s where the U.S.  Army admitted to spraying a mysterious chemical fog over a neighborhood in St.  Louis, Missouri, which residents now claim it is giving them cancer.   It includes Project Storm Fury, a series of efforts in the 60s and 70s to weaken hurricanes by seeding clouds with silver iodide.  And it includes Operation Popeye, an effort to create monsoons to aid our military efforts during the Vietnam War, literally weaponizing weather.   While these are different events scattered throughout history, a serious campaign to commercialize geoengineering to fight global warming would be a vastly larger enterprise and profitable.
Hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars could disappear into the coffers of research universities and the academic scientists who beat the drum of global warming alarmism.  Venture capitalists are already trying to get rich backing companies like Make Sunsets, which inject aerosols into the atmosphere to reflect sunlight back into space.   It's worth asking, what if scientists could somehow manage to create a temperature dial that could be rotated to reliably set the global climate?  Who would control the dial?  After all, people in different regions prefer different weather conditions based on their local geography, economy, and way of life.  The global climate impacts everyone and doesn't respect state or national borders.   So would we need a world government to make choices on how to turn the climate dial?  Where does it end?  Despite the profound questions around geoengineering, the scientific community is pressing ahead, and they are getting financial support to do so from universities and left-leaning philanthropists like Bill Gates, who has funded geoengineering research.   a June 2023 Biden White House Science Office report on solar engineering notes.  Academia, philanthropy, and the private sector have examined preliminary applications of climate intervention techniques, such as stratospheric aerosol injection and marine cloud brightening, which are techniques classified as solar radiation modification, or SRM, intended to rapidly limit temperature increases.   One thing we learned from COVID is that it's a mistake to allow the professional scientific community alone to determine federal science policy.

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