Clouds hold key to predicting monsoon & climate change: DTE

Clouds hold the key to predicting monsoon and climate change, a green body today said and asserted that a better understanding of them can help predict lightning, which is the topmost weather-related cause of death in India.

Down To Earth (DTE), the development-environment fortnightly published by Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) which has come out with an analysis said that over 30,000 people have died since the 2000 due to lightning.

"Polluted clouds are capable of causing greater havoc, say scientists interviewed by DTE. Take the case of lightning. Since the year 2000, over 30,000 have died in India due to lightning strikes - making it the leading weather-related cause of death in the country," a CSE statement said quoting the magazine said.
 

"A comparison of the regions chronically affected by lightning with an aerosol emission map of India shows a strong correlation. The maximum number of lightning deaths comes from the Gangetic plains, central India and the Deccan plateau - regions that are home to the most polluting industries and burning of waste," the magazine wrote according to the statement.

Noting that clouds are a key component of the climate system because they help regulate the planet's temperature, the statement said that they are responsible for both heating up and cooling down the planet, depending on their type and where they are located, the magazine wrote.

"Understanding this dual nature of cloud is important because it shows how changes in clouds will affect the energy balance and radiation budget of the planet," the statement said quoting DTE writers.

DTE wrote that scientists were now zeroing in on aerosols, tiny microscopic particles, as the crucial factor in formation and evolution of clouds.

"Clouds hold the key to predicting monsoon and climate change," the statement said quoting the magazine.

Noting that the type of the aerosol and its abundance in atmosphere dictates the behaviour of the cloud, the magazine said that the greater the number of aerosols, larger is the number of cloud droplets.

"As cloud water gets distributed among too many aerosols, they result in larger numbers of small droplets, which do not produce rain. Polluted air, therefore, can suppress rainfall," it said.