{"id":36527,"date":"2026-05-08T01:37:48","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T01:37:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/36527\/"},"modified":"2026-05-08T01:37:48","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T01:37:48","slug":"vancouver-company-gets-1-million-to-test-anti-wildfire-cloud-seeding-technology-in-b-c","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/36527\/","title":{"rendered":"Vancouver company gets $1-million to test anti-wildfire cloud-seeding technology in B.C."},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

A helicopter works on the Dryden Creek wildfire, north of Squamish, B.C., in June, 2025.Tijana Martin\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

A Vancouver<\/a>-based company has been awarded up to $1-million to test cloud-seeding technology in British Columbia this summer that could reduce lightning strikes that spark devastating wildfires.<\/p>\n

Lightning caused 70 per cent of B.C. wildfires in 2024, accounting for more than 97 per cent of the roughly 1.1 million hectares that burned. Across the country, wildfires have increased significantly in recent years, as climate change<\/a> brings longer, hotter, drier summers. <\/p>\n

Vancouver-based Skyward Wildfire says it can help stop those fires before they even happen, by reducing the lightning that causes them. The new funding, delivered by Innovate B.C., a Crown corporation focused on advancing tech to help industry in the province, will be used to test whether its technology meets the rigorous operational standards required for wildfire prevention in the province.<\/p>\n

The company has been quietly testing its cloud-seeding technology for the past two years and has raised millions of dollars in funding. It has repeatedly declined to discuss how its technology works, and has not publicly disclosed exactly where testing was occurring. <\/p>\n

New push to set national standards for wildland firefighting protective equipment<\/a><\/p>\n

Cloud seeding is most often associated with efforts to increase rainfall. It\u2019s a type of weather modification technology that has existed for decades, and has been used with varying success to change weather patterns.<\/p>\n

\u201cWildfire agencies need more tools to help reduce risk on the highest-consequence days. This project is an opportunity to evaluate our approach in real-world conditions as part of broader wildfire-preparedness and prevention efforts,\u201d Skyward chief executive Sam Goldman said in a press release from the B.C. Ministry of Jobs and Economic Growth, which announced the funding on Thursday. <\/p>\n

The funding includes support for an AI-enabled prediction tool as well.<\/p>\n

Aircraft will be based in Kamloops, and will begin testing in July throughout B.C., the company said. In April, Skyward was also awarded $643,000 by NorthX, a Vancouver-based non-profit formerly known as the BC Centre for Innovation and Clean Energy. <\/p>\n

The company declined The Globe and Mail\u2019s request for an interview. In an e-mailed statement, Skyward said it\u2019s technology uses \u201ctargeted aerial operations,\u201d with \u201cinert, non-toxic materials in very small quantities, and any field activities are conducted in coordination with public-sector partners.\u201d<\/p>\n

Skyward\u2019s website says its technology is \u201cproven safe and effective\u201d and that its \u201cmethods and materials are safe and comply with all U.S. and Canadian federal requirements.\u201d<\/p>\n

Though the company\u2019s website does not use the term \u201ccloud seeding,\u201d it is repeatedly referenced in other online documents. A March 2025 press release<\/a> announcing Skyward as a finalist for a $200,000 wildfire innovation prize describes the technology as \u201ccloud seeding with safe, non-toxic materials.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2016, the Horse River wildfire tore through Fort McMurray. A decade later, what lessons did we learn?<\/a><\/p>\n

Unorthodox Philanthropy, a foundation that provided grant support to Skyward, in a blog post<\/a>, described the material Skyward uses as \u201can inert substance consisting of aluminum-covered glass fibres, which is regularly used in military operations to intercept and confuse enemy radar and can also dis-charge clouds.\u201d<\/p>\n

During the 2025 wildfire season the company was \u201cpartnering with British Columbia and Alberta wildfire services to provide landscape level solutions with more advanced aircraft, sensors, and forecasting,\u201d according to a document posted online<\/a> by the World Bank as part of a forest fire management workshop where Mr. Goldman was listed as a speaker. Diagrams contained in the documents show depictions of aircraft flying and dispersing \u201csafe materials,\u201d into thunder clouds.<\/p>\n

BC Wildfire Service said they were aware of the trials, but did not provide any further comments. <\/p>\n

Alberta\u2019s wildfire service did not respond to The Globe\u2019s requests for comment.<\/p>\n

The method the documents suggest the company is testing resemble one that was first trialled in the 1960s: seeding storm clouds with military chaff (small, metallic particles) or narrow fibreglass fibres covered in aluminum. <\/p>\n

The Alberta government has used other forms of cloud seeding since the 1990s to help mitigate the risks of hail storms<\/a> on the western prairies and Rocky Mountain foothills. That work involves spraying silver iodide into storm clouds from the wings of airplanes. The particles cause water droplets to condense, freeze and fall as smaller, relatively harmless hailstones before they become the golf ball-sized hunks of ice that can occur naturally and cause billions of dollars in damage.<\/p>\n

Cloud seeding has also been used to shift rainfall patterns, including across the U.S. China has used cloud seeding to instigate rainstorms and help reduce air pollution in Beijing. In 2021, Russia claimed to have successfully used cloud seeding to suppress a wildfire in Siberia.<\/p>\n

But Skyward isn\u2019t claiming it can turn the skies into the world\u2019s largest sprinkler system. Instead, it aims to stop lightning strikes that can cause wildfires before they happen.<\/p>\n

Militaries across the world have long used radio frequency chaff to frustrate and confuse enemy radar and missiles. Decades ago, researchers noticed that it may have an unintended but useful side effect: helping to dissipate the static charge in thunder clouds.<\/p>\n

In the 1950s, wildfire experts at the US Forests Service started a research effort called Project Skyfire, to test just how effective cloud seeding to prevent lightning could be. The results showed an ability to reduce cloud-to-ground lightning strikes by about 50 per cent, while the remaining lightning bolts were about 25 per cent less powerful.<\/p>\n

In the 1970s, the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration described using \u201cneedles\u201d of aluminum-coated glass fibres instead of silver iodide. About a third fewer lightning strikes in clouds treated with the chaff occurred. A 1976 report<\/a> said significant questions remained before the tech could be deployed.<\/p>\n

What survivors learned from Canada\u2019s worst wildfires<\/a><\/p>\n

If Skyward\u2019s technology works, it could be a game-changer during periods of peak fire hazard \u2013 often called fire weather \u2013 the hottest, driest, windiest days when the most devastating blazes tend to happen. <\/p>\n

But many questions remain, especially about what materials Skyward uses in its technology, and whether public notice is provided about when and where test flights will take place.<\/p>\n

Keith Brooks, program director at Environmental Defence, a charity focused on environmental protection, said it\u2019s essential to understand the technology and possible consequences. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf we are using some kind of geo-engineering, or cloud seeding technology, and we don\u2019t really know exactly what is being sprayed out there, then we don\u2019t know what the unintended impacts are going to be from that,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis is something that we should take seriously if we are going to be messing with aspects of our weather system, or climate system.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: A helicopter works on the Dryden Creek wildfire, north of Squamish, B.C., in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":36528,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[164,224,238,214,212,239,17,211,230,231,227,213,210,235,171,234,143,222,249,215,216,229,225,226,219,240,220,244,245,247,242,246,94,243,217,142,233,113,232,241,223,236,237,228,221,95,218,248],"class_list":{"0":"post-36527","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-vancouver","8":"tag-alberta","9":"tag-arts-news","10":"tag-bc","11":"tag-breaking-news","12":"tag-breaking-news-video","13":"tag-british-columbia","14":"tag-canada","15":"tag-canada-news","16":"tag-canada-sports","17":"tag-canada-sports-news","18":"tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","19":"tag-canadian-breaking-news","20":"tag-canadian-news","21":"tag-economy","22":"tag-education","23":"tag-environment","24":"tag-federal-government","25":"tag-foreign-news","26":"tag-globe-and-mail","27":"tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","28":"tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","29":"tag-government","30":"tag-life-news","31":"tag-lifestyle","32":"tag-local-news","33":"tag-manitoba","34":"tag-national-news","35":"tag-new-brunswick","36":"tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","37":"tag-northwest-territories","38":"tag-nova-scotia","39":"tag-nunavut","40":"tag-ontario","41":"tag-pei","42":"tag-photos","43":"tag-political-news","44":"tag-political-opinion","45":"tag-politics","46":"tag-politics-news","47":"tag-quebec","48":"tag-sports-news","49":"tag-technology","50":"tag-travel","51":"tag-trudeau","52":"tag-us-news","53":"tag-vancouver","54":"tag-world-news","55":"tag-yukon"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36527"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36527\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36528"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}