Overview

• On July 10, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin unveiled two online portals to address public inquiries into contrails, geoengineering and cloud-seeding.
• Zeldin declared that years of dismissing those raising weather modification questions would end, pledging honesty and transparency.
• The sites explain that contrails form from jet-engine water vapor at high altitudes and distinguish these from legitimate chemical releases by small aircraft for firefighting and cloud seeding.
• The announcement followed flash flood conspiracy theories linking geoengineering to the deadly Texas flood and provoked immediate criticism from Rep. Don Beyer.
• Meanwhile, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene has introduced federal legislation to ban weather modification with fines and prison terms, joining several Republican-led states that already restrict geoengineering.