India is investing in large-scale weather modification projects aimed at influencing rainfall, fighting droughts, and managing extreme climate conditions. This video explains how cloud seeding works, what technology is actually being used, and which Indian states have already tested artificial rain using aircraft, chemicals like silver iodide, and weather radar systems. We look at the science behind whether humans can really change the weather—or just slightly nudge natural systems. You’ll also see the risks, controversies, and environmental concerns that come with trying to engineer rainfall on a massive scale. 🌧️⚙️ Credit: CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en Polavaram ECRF: by Megha Engineering and Infrastructures Ltd https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:ECRF_Dam_of_Polavaram_vide_by_MEIL.webm https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Polavaram_works_video_May_2020_by_Megha_Engineering.webm https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Polavaram_Hydel_Power_Project_video_by_MEIL.webm CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en Polavaram Project: by Chaduvari https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Polavaram_Project_-1.jpg Construction Polavaram: by Irrigationindia https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Construction_Polavaram.jpg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:PVaramm...jpg Animation is created by Bright Side.
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00:00Did you know that India is building a megastructure visible from space?
00:05It's happening in Andhra Pradesh, a region home to 50 million people and some of the worst climates on Earth.
00:11When it rains here, it pours enough to cause massive floods.
00:15When it dries, it turns fertile ground into a wasteland.
00:19This ambitious construction is supposed to solve the issue once and for all.
00:23However, if this multi-billion dollar project backfires, the consequences could be devastating.
00:29Let's see why.
00:31The second longest river in India is called the Godavari.
00:34During the monsoon season, this river acts like a fire hose that nobody can turn off.
00:39We aren't talking about a drizzly afternoon.
00:42From June to September, the sky practically unzips.
00:45The water level rises and the river transforms from a calm stream into a chaotic force that swallows entire villages in days.
00:54But that's not all.
00:55A huge amount of that fresh water goes completely to waste.
00:59It rushes past the villages and dumps straight into the Bay of Bengal.
01:03Once it hits the salty ocean, it's useless for drinking or farming.
01:06We're talking about billions of gallons of much-needed water disappearing into the sea every single year.
01:13Now, on the other hand, we have the Krishna River Basin, just a few hundred miles away.
01:19There, it's literally the opposite issue.
01:22Farmers are staring at dry cracks in the ground.
01:24They're praying for rain that never comes.
01:27And Krishna does not get strong monsoon support, and most of its water is already used up before it even reaches this region.
01:35By the time it arrives, it's more like a tired stream than a healthy river.
01:40That's why the authorities looked at the map and came up with a solution.
01:43Basically, take the excess water from the Angry River and push it over to the Dry River.
01:50This brings us to the Polo Varum.
01:52The engineers are building a structure that's a giant machine, not just a wall.
01:57It's built to connect these two massive water systems, like running a giant pipe from the side that has too much to the side that has almost nothing.
02:05The project combines a massive earth and rock dam with a hydropower plant and a network of canals.
02:12However, the most impressive part of this layout is the spillway.
02:17It's a giant complex of concrete, channels, and support systems.
02:21It looks less like a dam and more like a fortress built for titans.
02:26It's a gigantic safety valve for the earth.
02:28It stretches for close to a mile across, wider than 10 football fields placed side by side.
02:35And rises several dozen feet above the riverbed.
02:38It's fitted with dozens of huge steel gates, each one weighing hundreds of tons.
02:44And built to hold back walls of water until the system decides to let them go.
02:49The spillway is incredibly powerful.
02:52It has a discharge of around 5 million CUSICs.
02:55In simple terms, it can blast out millions of cubic feet of water every single second.
03:01That puts it in the same league as the spillway at China's Three Gorges Dam, one of the most powerful flood control structures on the planet.
03:10Engineers designed it to handle what they call a thousand-year flood.
03:14And no, that doesn't mean you need to mark your calendar for the year 3026.
03:18It just means there's a 0.1% chance that a flood this massive will hit the valley in any given year.
03:25Why are the architects so obsessed with these safety statistics?
03:30Because the location leaves no room for error.
03:33The Godavari Delta downstream is home to millions of people.
03:37If this project backfires, meaning the dam breaches or the gates fail during a storm,
03:42it wouldn't just be a leak.
03:44It would be a human-made tsunami.
03:47The water meant to save the region would instead wipe it off the map.
03:51The construction pace of the Polovarum project matches this insane scale.
03:57In 2019, the workers on this site set a Guinness World Record.
04:01They poured 42,000 cubic yards of concrete in exactly 24 hours.
04:07If you loaded all that concrete into standard mixers, you would fill 4,000 trucks.
04:14Line them up bumper to bumper, and you'd get a traffic jam stretching for 22 miles.
04:18Even with that in mind, the project still has a way to go.
04:23It's so big that it starts to bend its own surroundings.
04:27It won't just stop or redirect water.
04:30It might change the air itself.
04:33Once the dam is complete, it will hold a reservoir so large that it'll function like a brand new inland sea.
04:40Put that much water under the Indian sun, and something obvious will happen.
04:44It'll lift into the air.
04:46Day after day, the surface will turn into a giant steam engine sending moisture upward.
04:53Scientists call this a microclimate, but we call it accidental weather control.
04:59By creating a massive body of water, you change the local humidity and temperature.
05:04You're essentially installing a giant humidifier in a region that used to be dry.
05:08This is the part that makes experts nervous.
05:13What if they accidentally create a new climate problem while trying to solve the current one?
05:18Once you block a river and create a lake this big, you start messing with the heat and moisture in the air above.
05:26The system meant to control water on the ground ends up influencing the weather overhead too.
05:31Then, there is the issue of moving the water.
05:35Picture the state as two giant tanks.
05:38One is overflowing and about to burst.
05:41The other is dry.
05:42The engineers are trying to connect them with a massive pipe to balance the levels before either one becomes a disaster.
05:49How are they doing this?
05:50To pull this off, they're carving out the earth, digging two massive canals, each stretching more than 100 miles.
05:58These aren't simple ditches.
06:00They're artificial rivers carved to ignore the natural layout of the land and go where engineers tell them to go.
06:07In 2022, monsoon floods slammed into the site mid-build.
06:12Water forced its way past temporary barriers and damaged critical leak control work.
06:17The crew had to stop, assess the damage, and start restoring the damaged sections.
06:23And the risks aren't just about concrete breaking.
06:27The real cost of this project is human.
06:30To build the City of Water, you have to remove the real cities of people.
06:35When the reservoir fills, it will submerge nearly 250 square miles of land.
06:41That much water does not make room for anyone.
06:44Close to 200,000 people would have to be relocated.
06:48Old forests, tribal lands, and villages that stood for generations will disappear beneath the surface.
06:55This is the price of the project.
06:58So, with all this concrete and chaos, when does the ribbon get cut?
07:02Here's the twist.
07:04This project has been ongoing since the 1940s, back when the British were still in charge.
07:09It's a rare piece of infrastructure that has outlived conflicts and economic crashes, yet it's still under construction.
07:24Major parts of the main dam are incomplete.
07:27The reservoir cannot be filled to its full height.
07:29And key power systems have not been installed.
07:33Several resettlement zones also remain unfinished, which means the final stage of the project is still years away.
07:41Aside from the ambition and the scale, money is also the reason it takes so long.
07:47Early plans estimated about $1.5 billion.
07:50Today, the cost has passed $6.5 billion and keeps climbing.
07:57But is it worth the price?
07:59Depends on who you ask.
08:01For the farmers watching their fields dry out, the answer is yes.
08:04For the families watching their homes get swallowed by the reservoir, the answer is no.
08:10The latest deadline for completion is by the end of this decade, so there are no more excuses.
08:15The Polavarum Project is a testament to human ambition.
08:20It's humans looking at Mother Nature and saying,
08:22I think you put that river in the wrong place.
08:25Let me fix that for you.
08:26Will it work?
08:27And how well?
08:29We'll find out soon.
08:30Until then, the Godavari will keep flowing and overflowing,
08:34while the Krishna will keep shrinking, looking like an abandoned movie set.
08:38That's it for today.
08:40So hey, if you pacified your curiosity, then give the video a like and share it with your friends.
08:45Or if you want more, just click on these videos and stay on the bright side.
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