ing the many separate elements, public and private, into a productive national program.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Senator ANDERSON. Thank you very much.

You comment on the use of private entities because manpower is not available. Is there a pool of manpower in private agencies and the universities which could be used to conduct the program so that they could participate?

Mr. HOWELL. There is certainly a pool of manpower that can be used in some parts of this project. Having worked with a number of private industrial organizations, I am very much aware that there are sources collateral, let us say, to those of professional meteorology, which, by adequate leadership in this science, can be brought into effective combination with existing nuclei of professional competence and can serve as seeds for new nuclei.

Senator ANDERSON. Thank you very much. I appreciate your coming.

Our last witness is Mr. Braham.

STATEMENT OF ROSCOE R. BRAHAM, JR., PROFESSOR OF METEOROLOGY, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, AND DIRECTOR OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO CLOUD PHYSICS LABORATORY

Mr. BRAHAM. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, my name is Roscoe R. Braham, Jr. I am a professor of meteorology at the University of Chicago and director of the University of Chicago Cloud Physics Laboratory. It is a privilege for me to have this opportunity to express my views concerning the proposed legislation, S. 2875.

What, by way of experience and background, can I bring to bear on this subject? Since early 1946 my work has been the study of clouds, primarily in field experiments, including cloud modification, as a scientist in Government and at the University of Arizona, the New Mexico Institute of Mining & Technology, and at the University of Chicago.

Over the years this work has been supported by many different Government agencies-Weather Bureau, Air Force, Atomic Energy Commission, Public Health Service, National Science Foundationprivate foundations and private university funds. At present I serve, or have recently served as a consultant on weather modification research for the U.S. Army, the Bureau of Reclamation, and the U.S. Weather Bureau.

I am pleased to note in S. 2875 the implicit recognition that weather modification, particularly cloud seeding for precipitation changes, are important and worthy of increased attention and support. I heartily endorse the principle that the Department of the Interior should play a key role in the development of precipitation modification technology. I also believe, however, that the proposed legislation is unrealistic in its concentration, within that Department, of authority and responsibility for research on a broad front in the atmospheric sciences, training of scientists, and regulation of cloud seeding activities.

Therefore it is my view that enactment of this bill, in its present form, is not in the best interests of a speedy and orderly development

of a program for effective, beneficial utilization of atmospheric water resources. I propose to touch upon these various points in greater depth within this statement.

My views on several broad aspects of weather modification research and the role of Government in organizing for such research were covered recently in a statement before the Senate Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce. I will not repeat that material; however, I can provide additional copies of it should you desire them.

It is instructive to discuss the present legislation against the backdrop of a national program in weather modification. The recent report of the National Science Foundation Special Commission on Weather Modification states the elements of a national program in the following way, to which I subscribe:

(1) Strengthened fundamental research in all phases of cloud and weather science.

(2) Development of the technology of weather and climate modification for deliberate intervention in atmospheric processes with consideration for social, biological, and legal aspects.

(3) Provision for operational application of this technology as rapidly as techniques are validated.

(4) Provision for regulation and protection of public interest while at the same time insuring advancement of the state of the

art.

Senator ANDERSON. Don't you agree those four fundamentals are pretty well subscribed to by nearly every one in this field? We all want to strengthen research, do we not?

Mr. BRAHAM. Yes, I think this is true. I think our differences in the point of discussion arise from the relative strength we place on the four and opinions as to how applicable today a provision such as No. 3 might be.

Senator ANDERSON. What I am trying to say is that, regardless of whether the Weather Bureau does it or Department of the Interior does it, or a committee of the NSF does it, these are the things we ought to do.

Mr. BRAHAM. That is correct.

ORGANIZATION FOR OUR EFFORT

I endorse the principle that we reaffirm the responsibility of the Department of the Interior for management of water resources throughout all of the United States and that we recognize that this responsibility extends to research and testing operations designed to improve and regulate the yield from atmospheric water resources.

I agree that weather modification studies have reached the point where it is necessary to test existing hypotheses in the context of local geographical and meteorological conditions. The mission responsibility of the Department of the Interior gives them clear motivation for assisting with these tests. But from my view as a scientist, their strengths center around testing and reduction to practice of promising cloud seeding techniques, as opposed to scientific analysis of clouds and weather processes on a broad front. Resources and competence for the latter are to be found in several Government departments and at universities.

We must recognize that present cloud seeding and weather modification techniques are crude and of limited application. Years, maybe decades, of basic study stand between us and the achievement in our quest for a truly usable technology of weather modification. Thus most cloud seeding tests have been limited to looking for overall effects. However useful such conclusions may seem, they are of the crudest kind of knowledge.

We must strive to understand why particular tests turn out as they do. Once we have confirmed that a particular cloud-seeding experiment produced changes in precipitation we immediately wonder whether the net effect was the small difference between many large positive and negative effects mixed together. We ponder, too, the outcome of tomorrow's test since tomorrow's meteorological situation will probably differ from today's, and we wonder how we might do even better. The present understanding of basic cloud physics is not adequate to extrapolate the results of a particular experiment to the thousands of other combinations of geography, meteorology, and seasonal situations in which precipitation modification may be desirable. Moreover, precipitation modification cannot be separated from most other weather modification efforts, for example, modification of severe storms, hailstorms, hurricanes, et cetera, will undoubtedly also affect their water yield.

Therefore, it is essential that we determine the why as well as the yes-no of cloud seeding.

It is my view that development of the science and technology of precipitation modification can only come as fast as there is increase of knowledge over the broad front of meteorology, and development of trained scientific talent in theoretical and experimental meteorology. The universities have a major role in these developments as also do several executive departments.

REGULATION OF SEEDING ACTIVITIES

There appears to be need for some sort of regulatory-licensing legislation to prevent mutual interference of worthwhile research projects, to give a platform for arbitration between sponsors for qualified research projects and commercial cloud-seeding interests, and to give the general public a spokesman in the planning and execution of major weather modifications experiments.

As has been pointed out many times, useful weather modification experiments are likely to be lengthy and are likely to require particular areas to be designated as target and control. This automatically forces the residents in these areas to accept the advantages and/or disadvantages which may accrue to them by virtue of being in the target and/or control area. These points speak for assignment of the regulatory-licensing responsibility to a particular government agency or board.

In my view, it is crucial that this responsibility be vested in a group having no other interests in atmospheric sciences in general and weather modification in particular. The decisions of this regulatory body will be tough enough, without giving to that body the additional handicap of direct association with, or responsibility to, an agency having statutory responsibility or mission interest in the weather modification question.

I support the suggestion of Dr. Wallace Howell before the Senate Committee on Commerce on March 7, 1966, and before this committee this afternoon, for the formation of an independent weather modification board to be charged with the regulation and licensing of weather modification experiments by all agencies, both public and private. All activities concerned, Government and lay public, and private, basic research scientists and commercial operators should have representation on this board.

Senator ANDERSON. May I stop you there. Am I correct in understanding that your objection is not to the licensing but putting it in the hands of the Department of the Interior?

Mr. BRAHAM. Putting it in the hands of any agency having a vested legislative or mission interest in the subject of weather modification. Senator ANDERSON. That would include the Weather Bureau also. Mr. BRAHAM. In my view, yes.

Senator ANDERSON. I don't quarrel with you too much on that. I felt personally, and others did feel that you had to have some overall control of the situation. I explained that by my own peculiar experience. I was very much interested 2 or 3 years ago in experiments by Dr. Langmuir and Dr. Schaefer. There was always some private investigator who could upset the experiment by a project in the nextdoor area. It is true that you can't keep track of what is going on in the experiments except on a controlled basis. Do you subscribe to that in your particular agency?

Mr. BRAHAM. I think the number of cases where one can document that we have been in trouble thus fare are relatively few. However, I think, to the very extent that we are successfully in this quest for an operation and technology, the needs will become ever more apparent and it is time to get on with this aspect of the problem.

Senator ANDERSON. There may be very few, I won't argue that. If you are in a situation where you are trying to demonstrate, you might be interested in seeding clouds in the mountains of the State of Washington and on the other side of the mountain, in Spokane, a private operator can, with his experiment, prejudice your project in that sort of situation. That is the reason I am interested in licensing, to make sure we have an overall policy.

That would give you a chance to demonstrate your project without any interference by some outside source.

Mr. BRAHAM. That is right. If you are one of the few who have been affected it does not matter how many more there are. It is your problem that is important.

INDEMNIFICATION FOR GOVERNMENT-SPONORED RESEARCHER

I think serious consideration should be given to legislation to provide Federal grantees and contractors and indemnification against liability for damage resulting from Government supported weather modification research programs. Thus far this risk has been ignored or covered by insurance. However, to the very degree that our research activities pay off in improved weather modification technology this risk will increase.

We soon will approach the time when growing liability risks will deny university and private meteorological groups the opportunity to contribute to this field. This looms serious when we reflect that a

significant fraction of the scientific manpower in weather modification is presently in these, non-Government, groups.

Senator ANDERSON. I agree very firmly with that latter statement. I recognize we need some sort of protection because it can easily happen that a seeding operation might lead to excessive rainfall which is greatly appreciated by the city of New York, for example, for their reservoir, but no so much appreciated by the operators of a golf course. I think these are very good suggestions. I appreciate them.

If the Weather Bureau were left the responsibility for developing theories on which it might work, would you regard it as proper for the Department of the Interior to be charged with carrying out those theories with testing operations?

For example, this hurricane control you mentioned. Now Interior is not concerned with hurricane control. That is quite plain. But the use of the development for precipitation for the benefit of agriculture and storage of waters in packing snows is very definitely the responsibility of the Department of the Interior and not the Department of Commerce. Department of Commerce is a businessman's organization.

Mr. BRAHAM. I think my response to that would have to stem from this point of view: The major problem ahead of us in the area of weather modification technology at the moment, and I think for the next several years, is really a scientific one.

We need to draw upon and make full use of all of the scientific competence regardless of where it lies. Now, scientific competence, to my way of thinking, extends beyond the academic degrees that people have. I am sure you can go down on skid row in Chicago and find some Ph. D.'s lying in the gutter. You have to have motivation to do something with your tools in addition to having the tools. But combining these in terms of scientific competence, I think we need to use this competence wherever it is found. I think that to the extent the Weather Bureau, Interior, DOD, all of the agencies have an ability and an interest to contribute to these problems we need to welcome their participation.

Once we get to a fully operational technology, then it may indeed be an easier matter to assign responsibilities, but I think at the moment the problem is more nearly a scientific one than an operational one.

Senator ANDERSON. I was thinking of the fact that ESSA has no great responsibility in some of these fields.

To get back to the Atomic Energy Commission: Their research led to a new type of battery, a nickel-cadmium battery which is very reliable. Once it was developed then it became useful to the automotive industry. It was not proper for the Atomic Energy Commission to have control of that battery. It is in the commercial field.

Mr. BRAHAM. And there will be spinoffs It is hard to see what those will be but they will undoubtedly occur.

Senator ANDERSON. You have an interesting paper and I appreciate it very much.

Mr. BRAHAM. Thank you, sir.

Senator ANDERSON. Dr. Kahan, could I ask you a question?

You appear to have been approved by your professional standards by several people participating in this hearing. Do you regard weather predictions and weather modification as inseparable?