California Business Minute™

Hi, I am Tim Johnson and welcome to the California Business Minute.

In a news article by the Redding Record Searchlight, it identified that Pacific Gas and
Electric Co. has installed seven propane-burning cloud seed "generators" that propel
silver iodide particles into the air from atop ridges in Siskiyou and Shasta counties to
spur snow.

The generators are set to go into use by the end of winter and should enhance storms
over the Pit and McCloud river watersheds. The cloud seeding, which will be done 40 to
50 times a winter, should more than match the amount the water that flows over northern
California's signature waterfall.  PG&E officials identified it will produce 130,000 acre feet
of water per year, enough to flood 130,000 acres a foot deep in water, or 1.2 times as much
as flows each year over the falls near Burney.

The intent is to enhance snowfall in areas of snow pack by 5 to 10 percent to fill the PG&E
dams along the McCloud and Pit Rivers.

But the company's plans also have caused a flood of concern, especially from people in Siskiyou
County, where much of the snow would fall.

Officials at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Environmental Protection
Agency and the State Water Resources Control Board, as well as with both Siskiyou and Shasta
counties, said they don't regulate cloud seeding if it is done on private property. PG&E's generators
are on private land, mostly owned by Anderson-based timber giant Sierra Pacific Industries.

PG&E has been in contact with Siskiyou County officials and also reports that it has been operating
cloud seeding equipment for over 50 years near Lake Almanor.

I am Tim Johnson and this has been the California Business Minute.