AUSTIN, Texas (PNN) - July 7, 2025 - Weather modification efforts in Texas are regulated by the Texas Department of License and Regulation (TDLR). Individuals and organization who intend to conduct weather modification activities are required to obtain a weather modification license and permit from the TDLR.
Weather modification in Texas is meant to produce more rainfall during the growing season. The TDLR describes weather modification as “focused efforts to produce additional rainfall using cloud seeding are widespread in much of West and South Texas during the growing season, which extends from early spring until autumn each year.”
Roughly one-sixth of the land area of Texas is covered by concentrated cloud seeding covers.
Cloud seeding for the purpose of increasing rainfall is done using aircraft and sophisticated weather radar data. According to the TDLR, “[d]ecisions to deploy aircraft and disperse seeding materials (both silver iodide and salts) are made by trained meteorologists licensed by TDLR specifically for weather modification.”
The stated purpose of regulating weather modification in Texas is to ensure that the various methods of modifying the weather do not dissipate naturally occurring clouds or inhibit the natural production of rainfall to the detriment of people or property in the affected areas.
Meteorologists who direct the seeding operations must be licensed by the TDLR. Permits issued by the Weather Modification Program pertain to specific regions where seeding is intended and where cloud seeding aircraft may operate. A licensee may conduct more than one project, each of which requires that a specific permit be issued before it can begin seeding.
Most of the weather modification programs the TDLR issues licenses and permits to have been in operation for 20 years or longer.
The Weather Modification Program monitors ongoing seeding activities to ensure compliance with permits, helps to evaluate the impacts of cloud seeding, and assists individuals, organizations and governmental bodies in the design of cloud seeding operations.
It also administers federal grants for cloud-seeding studies and shares information on technological advances with other State agencies and interested organizations.
