Dubai Wasn’t Ready for a Storm or a Flood
If WE can’t control the weather, could AI?
Dubai, known for its sun, just had record rainfall, and its streets overflowed. The torrential rain was part of a thunderstorm system that passed through the region. The most rain they’ve had since records began 75 years ago.
Weather extremes seem to be getting more extreme and more frequent.
Is there anything we can do to stop it? Is there anything we are doing that is making things worse?
Despite a broad scientific consensus about climate change, some people aren’t on board. That’s a discussion for another time, though.
I want to talk about geo-engineering.
Various news sources suggested that recent cloud seeding efforts could have caused the heavy rain in Dubai.
Cloud seeding involves dumping silver iodide particles high in the atmosphere. It’s been done for over 70 years, by various groups, all around the world. The problem is that, for a long time, there just wasn’t any evidence that it made a difference. Meaning, was it actually working?
Since the 1990s, evidence has grown in favour of its efficacy. Even so, the recent cloud seeding could have produced only half a small amount of rain, not the deluge that we saw.
Scientists suggest that warm waters in the Persian Gulf were to blame for the storm system.
Either way, there is a clear need for us to control the weather as well as to predict it.
So, what would it take to actually control the weather? In nature, mountains are wind barriers. Are there strategic locations where we could build giant vertical panels that could form a barrier to wind flow, or a guide to push it in one direction or another? I mean, we could probably generate wind power at the same time, right?
Quite aside from the technical issues, required materials, and so on, we’d also need to understand the weather a lot better than we currently do. Admittedly, we do our best learning by trying. As long as the lessons are not (literally) Earth-shattering. We have our short-term forecasts. But the models don’t go far into the future, as I’ve said time and again. We’d have to build a barrier and then see how it affects the winds, both locally and at greater distances.
Anyone who’s walked beside an apartment building is well aware of the wind tunnel effect. These are localized effects, but while you’re in the middle of them they can be quite powerful, and certainly noticeable.
Giant buildings have only a limited set of wind effects, based on incoming wind direction. But what if the building (or building-sized barrier) could rotate? I remember there was a Frank Lloyd Wright house that could be rotated through the day so that the sun always shone into it. (Lifestyles of the rich and famous, right?)
What would it take to achieve repeatable effects from a line of such rotatable buildings, that could force the wind in a certain direction over a distance kilometers (or miles) wide? Even if we could make this kind of giant directional air vent, how far would the effects reach?
The higher the barriers, the greater the effect. Still, the effects would remain fairly localized, because it is the higher level winds, the jet stream, that really funnels weather around the planet.
Could we build something that high and that strong?
Another idea for an application of wind barrier experimentation: could we counteract the natural tendency for tornadoes to form? Is there some configuration of positionable wind barriers that could reduce the vortices, or neutralize the forces, which lead to the appearance of tornadoes?
Is there some configuration that could make tornadoes worse? I’m not suggesting deliberately making tornadoes worse, but if we know how to make them worse, we can also make sure we aren’t doing anything that makes them worse, right?
Could wind barriers encourage cloud formation, thereby increasing the likelihood of rain? Could they disperse clouds, ensuring clement weather for already-soaked areas?
Could we get moist winds roiling into the Sahara, to re-green it?
And, humans being as they are, could this idea be weaponized? Just look at what happened in Dubai. I’m not saying it was anything other than a natural weather event. But Dubai is unprepared for floods. If this kind of technology existed, we could hit our geo-political enemies where it hurts: floods in the desert, droughts on the plains, super-tornadoes on demand, debilitating snowstorms.
The possibility of weaponization is not a reason to avoid the technology. After all, a car or a plane is a weapon in the right hands.
I think we’d need a system spanning the planet so we could effectively tweak wind directions all over the globe. The system would need to be fully integrated, so it could act in unison, or in concert for a combined effect. There would need to be ongoing modeling of the highest level in real time, so that optimal conditions could always be tweaked towards.
And it is only natural that some kind of AI would need to be at the helm, because how could any group of humans stay on top of such a vast, chaotic, and unpredictable beast as the weather?
Have I stepped over the line into science fiction? Maybe, but at what point? If technological civilization survives on this planet, we’re going to find ways to engineer our environment, to optimize it for our advantage. We’re going to need sophisticated computer programs, and that increasingly means AI.
Assuming, for a moment, that we remain in control of AI or that AI chooses not to destroy us, then AI becomes either a valuable tool or trusted ally in whatever we do.
Thanks for reading!