.jpg)
Microsoft founder and former CEO of Microsoft, Bill Gates, is part of a team that has applied for five patents to manufacture hurricane preventing technology.
Hurricane Katrina caused billions of dollars in damage, inestimable losses in human lives and property destruction, and raised a serious question about the efficiency of FEMA.
But can we stop or control hurricanes? More importantly, should we?
Bill Gates, along with his former CTO at Microsoft, Nathan Myhrvold thinks we should. They filed for the patents last year at Bellevue, WA. based Searete LLC, an entity of Intellectual Ventures, currently managed by Myhrvold.
According to a Searete spokesperson, who declined to elaborate, Bill Gates is involved in the weather modification strategy, but the patents aren’t expected be granted for another year or more.
The basis for the modification plan is to use multiple specially-equipped ocean vessels to essentially lower the temperature of the Gulf Stream water surface, by pulling deeper, colder water up into the mix.
Pertinent passage from one of the modification patents:
The temperature decreases rapidly with depth, for example, as much as 20 degrees Celsius with an additional 150 m (500 ft) of depth. This area of rapid transition is called the thermocline. Below it, the temperature continues to decrease with depth, but far more gradually. In the Earth's oceans, approximately 90% of the mass of water is below the thermocline. This deep ocean consists of layers of substantially equal density, being poorly mixed, and may be as cold as -2 to 3.degree. C.
David Nolan, associate marine biologist from the University of Miami had this to say about controlling hurricanes:
"Every couple of years there's a news story that gets picked up for some hurricane-suppression idea," Nolan told TechFlash recently. "They’re all kooky in their own way. Some of them are more plausible than others, but they all face an enormous problem of scale. ... You would have to cover an incredible area with this effect to reduce the temperature of the ocean by a significant amount."
Between the years of mid 1960 to the end of the 70’s, the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) researched hurricane control in an experiment known as Stormfury, where the concept of “seeding” intense storms with silver iodide was explored. The theory was to increase precipitation outside the “eye” of the storm, causing it to cool and fall in on itself, thereby reducing the storm’s intensity. It never worked. After millions of dollars to fund the study, researchers discovered that hurricane systems already include ice crystals, which is what the silver iodide was supposed to duplicate.
Other weather modification ideas have included stratigically placed Earth-orbiting solar satillites, to heat specific sections of the ocean’s water, in an effort to draw or steer the hurricane away from populated coastlines. Another idea was to use gigantic land positioned windmills to literally “blow” the storm in another direction. Since water evaporation is drawn up into the storm as fuel, the idea of spreading a layer of “biodegradable oil” over miles of the ocean’s surface has also been a theory also considered by researchers.
All these ideas have major draw backs and ecological consequences that would be almost impossible to anticipate. Controlling Mother Nature is a dangerous game, when one system is modified without consideration of other systems, environmental impacts, and so on. The potential ecological domino affect could be disasterous.
What would happen if human controlled storm manipulation resulted in damage to other continents? How would the disturbance of the ocean’s temperature and Gulf Stream affect marine life? What happens when weather patterns are distrupted to save lives and avoid damage in one area, but causes drought and temperature disruption in another? How would using massive numbers of weather-control vessels spread out over miles of ocean, impact shipping lanes? What ramifications would aquatic related climate tampering have on global warming? What kind of fuel would the vessels use and how much? How about increased potential for ship collisions and oi/fuel spills?
According to NOAA, weather modification is a risky proposal that might not be worth all the money and effort to put into a hurricane stopping system.
However, a person who lost loved ones, friends, homes, precious belongings, pets, personal dignity, and everything else they owned in a Hurricane like Katrina--might have a different opinion.
***
For photo credit run cursor over photograph * Copyright Jean Williams 2009 * Author also writes under pen name DelilahStarling. Permission to reprint up to three paragraphs with a direct “read full story” back to this page. Contact creatinggreenpiece@juno.com
Comments
Whew. Can't wait to see what people say when I post this to a few networks.
I don't know anyone who thinks of Gates as a real philanthropist. He's chummy with the worst dictators in Central Africa, most notably Paul Kagame, and given to pontificate about what the Congolese people "should do," rather than what the U.S. military should do---get out of Central Africa and let Congo live.
The business model is a little unclear; who's gonna pay to cool the oceans off? And, it seems like more of the anthropocentrism that already got us this far down the road to climate hell.
Okay, so I'm not ready to throw Gates under the bus for "being chummy with the worst dictators of Central Africa", because there is truth to the expression, "keep your friends close and your enemies closer".
I would expect Bill and Melinda to be cordial to those kind of people, because their goal is humanitarian gain, not political persuasian.
But, I shudder at the thought of anything with the enormity and unpredictability of something like hurricane modification.
At the same time, every major invention in the history of human civilization has had to take enormous risks. We wouldn't be in space right now, if it weren't for the courage of taking risks.
Garrison says: "I don't know anyone who thinks of Gates as a real philanthropist".
Are you serious? Bill Gates retired from Microsoft last year to promote full time the work being done by the Gates Foundation for children in Africa and third world countries.
They have done more to educate the people of Africa on Aids prevention and have committed to saving children and have put in millions of their own money to do so.
Not a philanthropist? ...what a crock.
OMG, I agree with you! Garrison must be smoking something. The Gates Foundation has given more than any other group in the history of giving!
Bill Gates is a good man and I would trust him with climate control before I would trust anyone else. I'm sure they have run a million computer programs that would tell them exactly what would happened if they attempt weather modification.
The really scary thing? Gates may know something that the rest of us don't know! I can see it now - Bill Gates saves the world!
Fascinating article Jean!
The technology is well developed. It is called Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC). The Department of Energy funded about $450 million in energy research before it was politically killed by the influence of fossil fuel interests. The most successful experiment to date produced 255 kW of electricity and 7,000 gallons per day of fresh water by consuming solar heat energy stored in the water and not using any fuel. Cooling the water to steal energy from a hurricane is a side benefit of a program which will fund itself and solve our energy needs. Pulling up nutrient rich waters from the deep will spur a fishing bonanza. Think Humboldt Current. kuhld@bellsouth.net
A bit of a God complex does Mr. Gates have? Trying to control the weather? I'm sure the technology involved will have many credible, important future applications. But stopping hurricanes is not likely to be one of them. Talk about upsetting the ecosystem of the Earth. Don't mess with Mother Nature!
great article. sounds like a science fiction movie. Gates sounds a bit nuts, and it does sound like something that is totally against the natural order of things - we better beware of getting what we ask for...what we reap we sow...
Atmocean, Inc. proposes to reduce hurricane intensity by using our patents-pending wave-driven upwelling pump. Our modeling demonstrates potential of about a half-category reduction if done properly. This is not cheap, however - likely costing $250 million per application. On the other hand, recent big storms in Gulf of Mexico each were well north of a billion, with Katrina over 100 billion. For more info click on www.atmocean.com
Teddy wrote:
>I'm sure they have run a million computer programs that would tell them exactly what would happened if they attempt weather modification.
Well Teddy, have you ever taken a meteorology class at the University level? Do you know about numerical weather prediction? Do you have any humbleness in terms of the LIMITS of these models? You sound like such an uneducated idiot (the power child of what people mean when they say Americans are losing their educational status in the world particularly with respect to math and science).
The NOAA's hurricane mitigation project was called "Stormfury," not "Stormfly."
Buddy, I checked back through my research and you are right, it was called "Stormfury" and not "Stormfly".
No doubt a product of my late night effort to get it done and published. Thanks for notifying me of the mistake, because, man, I hate it when that happens!
Finally Gates and Myrhold reveal their mettle! Thank you so much! What a pleasure to watch as they successfully divert a hurricane away from New Orleans or some similar high density enclave to fall harmlessly on rural people.
Ah the pleasure of watching all the money they ripped off of us for their crap OS being collected by the lawyers for hundreds and thousands of rural victims who but for Gates and Myrhold would have been spared by the "natural" path of the hurricane.
By the way Gates and MS used illegal means for which they were convicted to many of us out of business. They stole our business. I don't called the guilt money being distributed by Gates philanthropy anymore then it was philanthropy for the racist Ford or the monsters of steel, rail and oil to give away their ill gotten gains.
Gates and Myrhold sadly have no inventions that are actually important to the field they worked at MS. the only good technology out of Gate's MS was what he stole, or bought period
Once again, mankind wants to completely destroy ecosystems for the benefit of a few.
How sad.
not much of a scientist but maybe I can add my 2 cent in from a citizen's point of view. we ca look at it in a different way. we've already damaged the earth so it is possible that what b. gates and other powerhouse r doin is figuring out a way to correct what we've destroyed. It's niether one or the other utility, but both going with 'mother nature' and actively reversing man's environmental destruction. These powerhouses r lookin at the big picture 50-70 yrs from now that of human existance, sustainability, accountability, and progression.
i think it would work...stormfury didnt work because hurricanes are fueled by the heat of the water...if you can cool off the water...maybe you can't divert or kill a hurricane but maybe you can tame it a little bit and what gulf coast property owner, insurance company or state would not welcome that...mankind and nature have caused disasters that have caused people, wildlife and land to suffer for eons..other things have an affect on our weather..like cutting down the rainforest..and so forth..so why not try something that might avert a disaster and death. i'm all for it..i don't think Bill Gates is trying to play God, but if he can pull this one off, i'd say he deserves a Noble Peace Prize...
Because humans love to kill one another on a massive scale (history can help me out with this statement) wouldn't it be fair to suggest this might be the propaganda to push us all away from the concept that the military might already have this technology for the complete opposite result...I'd reckon a conjuring up a hurricane would make a nice weapon for some coastal nemesis like China ... or Iran...maybe? I know there's a bunch of atheists now-a-days, but no matter how cool you think Bill Gates is...it will be easier for a camel to squeeze through the eye of a needle than to enter heaven. Word.
i agree with dave about OTEC. But something is missing: to use this for another planets too. AS JuPITER.
Got something to say?
Examiner.com is looking for writers, photographers, and videographers to join the fastest growing group of local insiders. If you are interested in growing your online rep apply to be an Examiner today!