This site is hosted by the National Association of Science Writers
HENRY LANSFORD
Writing and Consulting
|
|
|
papers |
writing |
writing |
|
Since the early 1950s, when the application of cloud-seeding technology to try to modify the weather first came into widespread use in the United States, sporadic but sometimes bitter public controversies have developed in many parts of the country over whether, when, how, and by whom efforts to modify the weather should be undertaken or if, indeed, they should be undertaken at all. It has become increasingly clear in recent years that interaction between weather modifiers and the public can be a critically important factor in the success or failure of weather-modification projects, whether they are experimental or operational.
The National Hail Research Experiment (NHRE), funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and managed by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), began studying hailstorms over northeastern Colorado, southwestern Nebraska, and southeastern Wyoming in the summer of 1971, working from a radar facility and field headquarters near the little town of Grover, Colorado. From 1972 through 1974, the NHRE field research program included randomized cloud seeding during the peak hail season, along with convective storm research using instrumented aircraft, radar, a precipitation network on the ground, and a variety of other research tools and facilities. The randomized seeding experiment was discontinued at the end of the 1974 hail season, and the most recent NHRE field work was an intensive observational program conducted during the summer of 1976.
The need to include a comprehensive and carefully designed program of communication with the public and with state and local decision-makers was recognized in the earliest stages of planning for the experiment. As early as 1965, the report of the First National Symposium on Hail Suppression, held at Dillon, Colorado, under NSF sponsorship, pointed out that "the success of a large-scale hail modification effort requires early action in community relations and public information . . . ." A later planning document, "Plan for the Northeast Colorado Hail Experiment," produced in early 1969, stated that "A carefully planned and executed information program will be required to insure the understanding and cooperation of state and local officials and the resident population of the experiment area."
When NSF assigned responsibility for management of the experiment, by then known as the National Hail Research Experiment, to NCAR, I was asked, as NCAR's information officer, to begin planning a public information program for the experiment. Working closely with W.J.D. Kennedy (then head of the NCAR Research Support Group and now executive director of the Rocky Mountain Center on Environment), I already had written a position paper that summarized some potential public information problems that NHRE might present and suggested an appropriate posture for NCAR to take in its public information effort for the experiment. Here are some excerpts from this paper, dated February 18, 1969:
NCAR's top management accepted and supported the proposition that public information would be a critical element in the success or failure of NHRE and that a vigorous information effort should be started at once, even though field work was not scheduled to begin for more than two years. Early in 1969, the Director of NCAR discussed plans for the experiment with the Governor of Colorado. Kennedy and I gave a briefing on NHRE to the executive director of the Colorado Department of Natural Resources, who was responsible for licensing weather modifiers under the existing state law, along with several of his agency heads. We sent personal letters, with background information about the hail experiment, to county agricultural extension agents in the vicinity of the proposed field research area. A form letter and a brochure about hail research were mailed to 9,500 rural boxholders in the region. Letters, brochures, and news releases about plans for NHRE were sent to news media in the region, as well as to about 40 national and regional agricultural publications. Kennedy and I made personal visits to county agents, newspaper editors, and radio and television news directors, and I began giving talks about the hail experiment to farmers' and cattlemen's associations, service clubs, and other groups. We responded promptly, in person, by telephone, or in writing, to all requests for information about the experiment.
We maintained close liaison with state officials, especially during 1971 and '72 when new regulatory legislation for weather modification was being drafted by the Colorado legislature. I was one of two advisors, along with Prof. Lewis O. Grant of Colorado State University, who were asked to work with the Interim Legislative Committee on Weather Modification. The work of this committee resulted in the Colorado Weather Modification Act of 1972.
One primary goal of the NHRE public information program was to reach as many people as possible in and around the field research area with accurate information about what NHRE was and what it was not. In northeastern Colorado and many other regions in the High Plains, cloud seeding had been at the heart of some past controversies, over an operational program in the late 1950s and a research effort in the mid-1960s that had foundered, at least partly because of public opposition. We engaged a social-science research group, Human Ecology Research Services (HERS) of Boulder, to survey public attitudes toward weather modification in and around the field research area and to recommend ways in which we might interact effectively with the residents of the region.
One recommendation was that we establish a citizens' council composed of interested and influential people who were concerned with the impacts of hail and other weather phenomena on the economy and other aspects of the region. Before the first season of full-scale NHRE fieldwork began in 1972, the Citizens' Council on Hail Research was formed. This group initially included a dozen residents of northeastern Colorado and southwestern Nebraska--farmers, ranchers, a county agent, a farm machinery dealer, and others with concerns about the effects of weather on agriculture. This council met several times each year with the Director of NHRE and members of his staff, along with the NCAR information officer, to discuss current hail research activities and their relevance to the needs and interests of people who live in the region around the field research area.
Once the NHRE fieldwork got underway, a second phase was added to the public information program. Earlier work was designed to provide broad information about the goals and methods of the experiment. The new efforts were designed to provide prompt and complete information about cloud seeding and other day-to-day operations. During the summer of 1972, we mailed a weekly NHRE newsletter to county agents, news media, and anyone who asked to receive it. Each newsletter summarized the past week's NHRE activities and current weather conditions. In the summer of 1973, on the recommendation of Citizens' Council members and some other local people, we added daily radio reports. Each weekday afternoon, we telephoned a one-minute summary of NHRE activities during the past 24 hours to four area radio stations, where the reports were taped and broadcast on news and weather programs.
Although precise verification of the efficacy of a public information program is almost as difficult as determining the effects of cloud seeding, indications are that our program was effective in winning public approval and support for NHRE. During six years of fieldwork, which included three summers of cloud-seeding experiments, NHRE did not encounter any of the sort of organized and active public opposition that has halted or hampered many weather-modification programs in recent years. At a public hearing on NCAR's application for a state weather-modification permit in 1973, a few witnesses were mildly critical of some aspects of NHRE operations, but no strong opposition was expressed.
One interesting response to the NHRE public information program suggests that its form may have been almost as important as its substance. A preliminary report that we received from the HERS sociologists on their 1972 survey of public attitudes stated that: "In general, it can be seen that knowledge and acceptance are positively associated--the higher the degree of knowledge about NHRE, the greater the acceptance." However, later studies of public attitudes toward weather modification by Barbara Farhar of HERS and her colleagues have indicated that this positive association between knowledge and acceptance does not always exist. Sometimes additional knowledge has simply provided more ammunition for opposition to a weather-modification program. And later interviews by HERS staff in the NHRE area indicated that many people who were exposed to our public information program retained remarkably little specific information about the experiment but still tended to regard it favorably.
My own admittedly intuitive and qualitative conclusion is that, even if they did not remember all the details of what we told them, many people in the vicinity of the NHRE field research area concluded that, because we were working so hard to keep them informed about what we were doing, we must be an honest and responsible group of people who could be trusted to deal fairly with them.
Return to Professional Papers