TO SAVE AUSTRALIA

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 74, 28 March 1930, Page 11

TO SAVE AUSTRALIA

RAINMAKERS THE ONLY

WAY ENGLISH ENGINEER'S VIEWS A few months ago Mr. S. Upton, a visiting English engineer, came into the news by proposing to fill the dead lakes of the interior from the sea. He now writes in "The United Empire" (London) an account of "Australia's Drought Peril," in which lie predicts that .two-thirds of the Commonwealth will be arid desert unless it is found possible to precipitate moisture from the clouds. Mr. Upton has no respect for the opinions of Mr. Bromley, Divisional Commonwealth Meteorologist, on the weather and its ways- when it comes_ to a question of drought, says the Adelaide "Observer." He pours scorn on the j conclusions of Mr. Hunt,. Commonwealth Meteorologist. Tilting against the belief that meteorologists alone have the right to talk on artificial pre-1 cipitation of rain, he carries the war further. "In Australia," ho says, "the writer found a few months ago that in this and kindred subjects many ■were living in the past, governed by the dead or dying." A BIG JOB. The .offence of Mr. Bromley was to pour cold water on the schemes for artificial hastening of rain. In a lecture in Adelaide Mr. Bromley said that "owing to the immense scale of operations employed by Nature, man's efforts to produce rain of any consequence would ever end in failure, owing to the inadequate resources at our command." On the mcekanism of a thunderstorm, Mr. Bromley explained that it was not the electrical discharge which was responsible for the heavy rain, but the rain which, by the breaking up of its drops, produced the electricity, and thus the thunderstorm ... in order that the raindrops might be broken up and electrified sufficiently to caus.e thunderstorms, the uprising air so necessary for the production of rain meteorologically must be greater than 24 feet a second." This argument, is neatly .demolished by quoting Dr. G-. C. Simpson, who, "unfortunately for Mr. Bromley," says that an updraught of air of only eight feet a second is necessary to produce a, thunderstorm. Lord Birkenhead, it appears, is also on the side of the scientific angels, and includes "weather to order" among the amenities of life he anticipates for 2029. Mr. Upton himself considers that the problem of precipitation lies outside the functions of meteorologists, with "their finite minds and their incapacity for thinking outside the limits of their special accomplishment." The fact that Governments leave the weather to the care of Providence and the meteorologists, greatly alarms Mr. Upton. He foresees disaster for Australia if it neglects to precipitate moisture from the clouds:— In the last 15 years the total flow of the Great Artesian Basin has fallen by one-third, and tho total discharge of all its bores is greatly in excess of the replenishing supply. Unless artificial precipitation of rain can be brought about, fully 500,000 square miles, or one-sixth of the whole continent, will soon revert to desert; aye, to desert where not even pastoral occupation will be found practicable, as any thinking old pastoralist knows. This in addition to the 1,500,000 square miles of arid and desert waste in the west; just twothirds of the mighty Commonwealth all told. HELPING NATUKE ON. Mr. Upton's contention is that often an a dry season precipitation would not jieed to be artificially started to bring about the saturation of the arid substrata which intercepts moisture at the cloud level. It would only need to be accelerated in the slightest degree to give tho pastoralist the water he so badly wants. Does not rain fall heavily time and again in the upper regions of arid Australia, though only points or spots reach the ground? When the author was in South Australia in the.first part of 1929, he noticed, standing under a network of high tension wires on hot summer cloudy days, that heavy drops of rain seemed to fall upon his upturned face. Again, when he was by Lake Torrens during the drought, day after day there were cloud-laden skies. At times rain fell in the higher regions, though only spots reached the ground. It seemed as if some force was needed to cause the clouds to turn to rain more quickly, and in sufficient volume to enable it to reach the ground in spite of the interposed layer, of heated air. In the southern part of Australia, he contends, clouds are as much the rule as they are the exception in tho same season in. the Sahara and on the Red Sea coasts. "It is my belief that man should bo able, to produce water from the clouds by electrical anil other means at a price worth paying—and that without controlling the weather or changing the climate." TILLING THE DKY LAKES. Mr. Upton glances in passing at the belief of pastoralists that dry lakes precede droughts, and that their periodical re-filling prolongs or adds to tho rainfall in their neighbourhood. Ho quotes with approval the statement of Dr. Luisc Laminert, the. distinguished German geophysician, in an Adelaide lecture—that the lack of large areas of water and irrigated land in Australia had a detrimental effect upon its rainfall. Why not fill inland depressions ■with fresh and sea water, to add to the rainfall on the ranges which feed tho Great Artesian Basin? SIR OLIVER LODGE'S OPINION. On the problem of rain precipitation by electricity, Mr. Upton wrote to Sir Oliver Lodge, who replied, "I certainly think that the experiment ought to be tried of discharging high teflsioned electricity into clouds in order to make rain. . . I know that meteorologists have emphasised tho great amount of energy involved in the production of rain; but their implication seems to be that all this energy must bo supplied artificially, whereas I contend that tho greater part of it must be supplied by Nature, and that what we have to do artificially need be in some cases nothing more than a trigger action, which shall precipitate or bring about a dis- • charge of energy already accumulated. Local circumstance must determine "whether that condition is ever really satisfied." Sir Oliver suggests as the best method tho use of ii transformer and valves, j In the laboratory he transforms up to i any required potential, and then banks' up the electricity that is supplied by means of electric valves. There is an arrangement for supplying high tension electricity where it is wanted for any particular purpose. Mr. Upton points out that there aro many places in Australia specially suit- j able for making these experiments. In Tasmania, or up by Kosiusko, or at the northern end of Flinders Range, Or byj St. Mary's Peak. "In Tasmania, where cheap electric energy in plenty is available, tho experiment would be well worth making, no matter what it cost. Tho chances are it would be a success, and that Sir Oliver is right and tho meteorologists wrong. In any case, wo can but try— as Eyre and Sturt and the pioneers before us did. If the croakers of yajneo had had their way, man would never have conquered, the air; there would have been neither airships nor jvire-