Rainmaking questioned as efforts underway to fight air pollution

[webfact]

Rainmaking questioned as efforts underway to fight air pollution

By Pratch Rujivanarom 
The Nation 

 

Aircraft from the Royal Rainmaking and Agricultural Aviation Department take off |yesterday to undertake the first cloud-seeding mission in Bangkok.

 

RAINMAKING IS not the final answer to tackle air pollution in Bangkok and authorities should focus on controlling pollution emissions at their sources, Greenpeace representatives said on the first day of the operation to clean Bangkok air by producing artificial rain.
 

The Royal Rainmaking and Agricultural Aviation Department was making its first rainmaking flight to cleanse the air in Bangkok of particulate matter smaller than 2.5 microns (PM2.5) yesterday, as the capital continued to suffer from severe air pollution since last month with no signs of improvement.

 

Four rainmaking planes from Royal Rainmaking Operation Centres in the Central and Eastern regions were tasked with the mission, as it was intended that artificial rain would wash very fine particulate from the air and improve its quality.

 

The latest air quality update from the Pollution Control Department (PCD) and an international air-pollution monitoring website showed that Bangkok’s air quality was expected to remain at critical levels, as PM2.5 measurements at every monitoring station in Bangkok showed levels exceeding 50 micrograms per cubic metre of air. The cold weather was expected to continue, which would intensify the problem.

 

The director of the Central Region Royal Rainmaking Operation Centre, Rattakorn Warunsukkhasiri, said if the rainmaking operation was successful people in Bangkok could expect rain within three hours.

 

However, Rattakorn said the amount of rain and location would be determined by weather conditions affecting cloud formations and could not be predicted precisely.

 

He said the outcome of the artificial rain project had not been seen yet, as the rainmaking team was still working.

 

“Our rainmaking team will continue on this operation every day until this weekend, or until the air pollution problem in Bangkok is resolved,” he said.

 

However, Greenpeace coordinator on climate change and energy, Chariya Senpong, said rain could improve air quality, but only for a short period of time.

 

She encouraged authorities to solve air pollution problems at their origin by controlling emissions and to set up accurate and real-time air pollution warning systems instead.

 

Chariya highlighted that rainmaking was just a short-term measure and if fossil fuels continued to be burned for transport and energy, the problem was insurmountable.

 

Moreover, she also warned that as rain cleaned particulate matter from the atmosphere, toxic substances such as cadmium, mercury, hydrocarbon compounds and other heavy metals associated with PM2.5 would be carried into the water and would pollute the environment.

 

“Even though some relief measures are better than no measures at all, I urge the PCD to focus on getting rid of pollution at its source to ensure that air pollution is sustainably solved in the long term,” she said.

 

“The PCD also needs to include PM2.5 levels in the national Air Quality Index and show real-time hourly levels of PM2.5 to the public, so people will be informed of the threats to their health from air pollution and can properly protect themselves.”

 

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/detail/national/30338684

 

-- © Copyright The Nation 2018-02-13

 

[mrmicbkktxl]

i just read air quality is fine

 

[rkidlad]

Where are these clean buses??? Really. With all the money being spent on the BTS line, could we not just have a few clean buses around? You could also label yourselves the hub of clean buses in South East Asia.  

[eliotness]

I was involved in the mid 1970s in environmental analysis in Central Manchester in England.  The pH of rainfall was regularly down as low as 5.0 and the roadside dust contained dangerous levels of lead. Manchester had very bad air quality in those days even though it was well known for its frequent rainfall.

This proposed use of rainfall is a simple attempt to transfer the pollution from one media to another.  It doesn't solve the problem and in the longterm may cause even more harm.

[Ulic]

I think the first line should read something like , Crossing your fingers and hoping it rains

is not the long term solution to air pollution. 

 

[Cake Monster]

They could maybe use the Hair Driers from all the Beauty Parlors to blow the polluted air away in a similar fashion to the boat propellers used during the floods.. 

[peperobi]

[Beats56]

Is there any scientific evidence that this seeding works? If so why didn't California use it with their prolonged drought that lasted many years.

 

[malibukid]

they run the same story every year.

[Srikcir]

8 hours ago, webfact said:

the amount of rain and location would be determined by weather conditions affecting cloud formations

TRANSLATION:

We're waiting for a tropical storm.