Under the patronage of His Highness Sheikh Mansour Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Presidential Court, the National Center of Meteorology (NCM), through the UAE Research Program for Rain Enhancement Science (UAEREP) hosted a highly successful sixth edition of the International Rain Enhancement Forum (IREF) from 24 to 26, January 2023. Organized as a biennial forum, IREF provides a global platform for discussion of the latest developments and efforts to findRead more...

Cloud seeding aims to accelerate the hydrometeor growth and consequently convert water contained inside clouds to snow or rainfall more efficiently than it would naturally. Due to its importance in tackling water scarcity, seeding clouds by the release of hygroscopic or glaciogenic aerosol particles in convective clouds to enhance precipitation has received increasing scientific as well as commercial interest. While glaciogenic seeding in orographic clouds has consistently shown positiveRead more...

With an annual precipitation ranging from 20–40mm to 140–150 mm, the UAE is one of the driest countries in the Middle East, making it highly vulnerable to climate change impacts in the future like the rest of the region. Furthermore, the UAE’s precipitation trends are projected to decrease by 20% by the year 2050 and 45% by 2100, compared to the period 1961 to 1990. This has prompted the UAE Research Program for Rain Enhancement Science (UAEREP) to fund a project titledRead more...

Aerosol particles play a central role in cloud microphysics and hence in the formation of precipitation. In warm clouds, the process of precipitation formation begins with the nucleation of cloud droplets on aerosol particles. Many studies have explored the possibility of sending an electric charge into aerosol particles to induce precipitation. Such methods can potentially help countries like the UAE reduce the risk of water stress given the high levels of dust andRead more...

‘Warm rain’ generation, a process that does not involve an ice phase, depends on the characteristics of the cloud Droplet Size Distribution (DSD). Observations show that the formation of warm rain requires large droplets with a radius exceeding 12 - 14 micrometers prior to the development of warm rain. Another key factor in warm rain formation is the width of DSD, as wide DSDs promote the growth of drizzle-sized drops through collision-coalescence. To better understand DSDRead more...

Precipitation generation requires a combination of conditions such as moisture availability, cloud processes that can grow droplets to large sizes, and conditions in which droplets can reach the surface without evaporating. Understanding the details of rainfall generation in these conditions is important for weather forecasting and for the evaluation of artificial interventions to increase rainfall. Despite the presence of rain-bearing clouds, surface-reaching rainfall amounts remain scarceRead more...

Abu Dhabi-UAE: 5 October, 2021 – The National Center of Meteorology (NCM) announced its participation in the 23rd edition of Water, Energy, Environment Technology Exhibition (WETEX) 2021, which is running from 5 to 7 October, 2021 at the venue of Expo 2020 Dubai. Showcasing the Center’s key achievements and the latest technologies in rain enhancement science and research, the NCM pavilion at WETEX will provide visitors with an overview of the nine research projects receivedRead more...

Hygroscopic seeding accelerates precipitation formation by suppressing the activation of the natural, less hygroscopic particles, and or by promoting the formation of larger water drops directly. The seeding particles become activated at lower supersaturation due to their higher hygroscopicity and larger size compared to background cloud condensation nuclei (CCN). Different techniques are used to estimate the droplet spectra just after the activation. In most bin microphysical models, onlyRead more...