China launches cloud-seeding rockets to counter severe droughts

Asia-Pacific, News August 19, 2022 , by IRIA No Comments

China is carrying out large-scale cloud-seeding operations in an attempt to induce rainfall in the central and southwestern provinces amid the ongoing record-breaking heatwave and severe drought.

Intense heatwaves and droughts have plagued China in recent times as temperatures are rising all over the country. The precipitation levels in China have decreased significantly in the last few weeks. Yangtze River, one of the longest rivers in Asia, is now at its lowest levels at some stretches.

Droughts and water shortages are also affecting China’s hydro-power reservoirs resulting in a widening gap between power supply and demand.

According to China’s National Climate Center, the two-month-long heatwave is the longest one ever recorded in China. The temperatures in China’s Sichuan and neighboring provinces have exceeded 40 degrees Celsius. As the result, provincial governments in the drought-stricken provinces of Hubei and Sichuan have resorted to extreme measures and cloud seeding operations.

According to the local media reports, the provincial administrations are launching rockets into the sky carrying chemicals to induce rain and refill the crucial Yangtze River.

In Anhui province, meteorologists blasted nearly 1,000 salt flares into the clouds during a two-day operation. The resulting rain varied in different areas. Similarly, in Hubei province, 159 different cloud seeding operations were carried out, while in Chongqing city, more than 625 cloud seeding cannons and two cloud seeding rockets were fired into the sky in a desperate attempt to make it rain.

A dried riverbed is exposed after the water level drops in the Yangtze River in Yunyang county in southwest China's Chongqing municipality on August 16, 2022 — *^{A dried riverbed is exposed after the water level drops in the Yangtze River in Yunyang county in southwest China’s Chongqing municipality on August 16, 2022. (Image Credit: AP)}*

The severe heatwave and low precipitation have affected China’s power supply operations in several provinces. With increasing temperature, the demand for air conditioning has increased unprecedentedly. The government is taking drastic desperate measures to keep the systems running. The government in the Sichuan province has asked the citizens not to lower the air conditioning below 26 degrees Celsius. Workers are also being advised by the government to use staircases instead of lifts and elevators in order to save electricity.

Several factories have halted their production plants due to extreme temperatures and power shortages in Sichuan province. Some remote towns and villages have also reported blackouts. A notice posted on the provincial government’s website stated that Sichuan had only “encountered [such] extreme high temperature once in 60 years” and that the average rainfall had fallen by 51 percent from the same period in 2021.

“The sharp drop in water inflow from major river basins has caused a sudden drop in the output of hydro-power generation. The contradiction between power supply and demand in the province is very prominent.” the notice said.