Conspiracy theories from the darkest corners of the internet are fueling a wave of new legislation in state legislatures this year that seek to ban geoengineering projects supposedly aimed at cooling the earth’s climate.
Tennessee legislators passed a first-in-the-nation ban on geoengineering activities last year. Now, lawmakers in at least 10 states have introduced bills to restrict weather modification, cloud seeding, solar radiation modification and other activities that fall under the catch-all umbrella of geoengineering.
“This bill seeks to protect Arizona’s environment, health, agriculture and economy by prohibiting geoengineering activities,” Arizona Rep. Lisa Fink (R) told fellow lawmakers at a committee hearing on her bill to ban the practice. “Geoengineering can threaten natural resources, disrupt weather patterns critical to farming and endangering wildlife.”
Similar bills have been introduced this year in Iowa, Kentucky, Mississippi, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Utah and Wyoming. Most of the bills have been introduced by Republican lawmakers, though the Rhode Island version features two Democrats as primary sponsors.
Experts who study the science and politics of climate change say that most of what the bills seek to prohibit — specifically solar radiation modification, a deliberate effort to reflect sunlight away from earth through the use of aerosols — is not actually happening.
“There are clusters of conspiracy theories that are sort of melding together and driving these initiatives,” said Joshua Horton, a senior program fellow at the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government at Harvard’s Kennedy School. “They seem to have a common origin among chemtrail conspiracy theorists.”
The chemtrail conspiracy theory is the unfounded notion that condensation trails left by aircraft are chemical or biological agents spread by the government or deep-state actors to cause harm.
In public testimony, lawmakers who have introduced geoengineering ban legislation have insisted they have nothing to do with chemtrail conspiracy theorists. But those protestations are sometimes followed by testimony from members of the general public who openly say they believe the conspiracy.
“This started when I noticed lines in the sky that did not look normal. Afterwards, the lines became haze, covering the sun,” Jodi Brackett, a conservative activist who brought Fink the idea for a geoengineering ban, testified before lawmakers.
Fink did not respond to an email seeking comment.
Some weather modification activities are taking place, and have been for decades. As of 2021, at least eight states were engaged in cloud seeding activities, in which silver iodide particles are shot into the air to increase precipitation, according to Scientific American.
It’s not clear how well cloud seeding actually works to encourage precipitation. But scientists are intrigued enough that they warn blanket bans on geoengineering could preclude the positive effects of cloud seeding in the future. In Arizona, a lobbyist for the Salt River Project, the Phoenix area’s public utility, testified against the bill.
“We see great potential in cloud seeding as a viable way to generate more precipitation from clouds in the form of rain and snow, which is ultimately where the water that is delivered to our customers is derived from,” the lobbyist, Fareed Bailey, told lawmakers. “We do not want to close the door to this promising technology.”
Many of the bills introduced this year share similar language, though it’s unclear if there is a coordinated effort to introduce them. Some of the lawmakers who sponsored the bills said they got their ideas from concerned constituents.
“This issue was brought to me from multiple constituents that have become concerned about this issue,” Wyoming Rep. Reuben Tarver (R) said in an email. “We need to get the conversation started.”
One group, the Informed Consent Action Network, has published information obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA, which it claims shows increased research into solar radiation modification. That group, ICAN, is a leading proponent of anti-vaccination information; its leader, Del Bigtree, served as communications director for Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s presidential campaign in 2024.
ICAN did not respond to a request for comment.
Lawmakers who back the bills say they are concerned with the impacts on public health caused by geoengineering. Some say they are concerned that higher levels of government — either the federal government or international governments — could violate their sovereignty by geoengineering the climate.
Kentucky “must assert its 10th Amendment sovereignty to avoid Federal or UN sanctioned geoengineering over” the state, reads a summary of legislation Kentucky Rep. John Hodgson (R) wrote by email. “Governments and [non-governmental organizations] have experimented with modifying weather and solar radiation by use of metals, chemicals, and other pollutants, in pursuit of goals like combatting climate change. These materials eventually end up in our soil and food, and are harmful.”
Scientists say the silver iodide is not harmful to humans, and that other geoengineering projects do not use harmful chemicals.
Horton, of Harvard’s Kennedy School, said there is an irony in conservatives taking up a crusade against geoengineering.
“The concern among a lot of people who followed geoengineering over the years is that, in terms of conservative politics, Republicans would learn about geoenginnering and embrace it as a way to avoid making emissions cuts,” he said. “That’s not what’s happened. What’s happened instead is this bizarre twist in the story in which you have Trump/MAGA embracing the conspiracy theory dimensions of geoengineering.”
Horton said there is little immediate risk to public health or well-being if the bills banning geoengineering pass — the bills do not prohibit much activity that is actually taking place. But, he said, the longer-term risks to public debate exist as the earth’s climate warms and new technologies come online.
“It’s almost a certainty that the idea of solar geoengineering will be on the table at some point in the next 15, 20 years,” Horton said in an interview. “If it works as advertised, as serious scientists have shown that it does in computer models, it could be tremendously beneficial.”
“That’s going to be a very difficult conversation, very controversial, for good reasons,” he said. “These kinds of bills being circulated, maybe put into law, are muddying the waters.”