On the Possible Use of Geophysical Cybernetics in Climate Manipulation (Geoengineering) and Weather Modification SERGEI SOLDATENKO 1 and RAFAEL YUSUPOV 2 1 Center for Australian Weather and Climate Research 700 Collins Street, Melbourne, VIC 3008 AUSTRALIA s.soldatenko@bom.gov.au 2 Saint-Petersburg Institute of Informatics and Automation of RAS Laboratory of Applied Informatics 39 14-th Line, St. Petersburg, 199178 RUSSIA yusupov@iias.spb.su Abstract: - Geophysical cybernetics is a new research area that studies the geophysical processes and phenomena using cybernetic methods and approaches. A mathematical formulation of the problem of optimal control of the geophysical system is presented from the standpoint of geophysical cybernetics. Further, the essential features of the geophysical system as a control object are considered. The optimal control problem for the large scale atmospheric dynamics is considered and the necessary optimality conditions are derived. Key-Words: - geophysical cybernetics, geophysical system, optimal control, atmospheric dynamics, weather modification, geoengineering. 1 Introduction The ongoing climate change, which scientific community agrees is predominantly a man-made phenomenon [1], represents one of the biggest challenges facing humanity today. For a very long time, mainly unwittingly, human civilization has been influencing the environment and changing its properties. Nevertheless, the current rate of climate change has no precedent in the available geological records or even in the known history of our civilisation. At the turn of the century, geoengineering, a new research and technological area, was proposed as an instrument to reduce global warming via an intentional intervention in the earth’s climate system. It is necessary to point out that many attempts and experiments to modify the atmospheric processes and weather phenomena have been made in the previous century. However, both geoengineering and weather modification are considered outside the scope of control theory. This gives rise to a number of very important problems, which are currently only formulated in general terms, such as problems related to the validation of the input and output variables, determination of the boundaries of both geoengineering activities and weather modification, statement of climate and weather manipulation goals as well as methods of achieving the objectives. Meanwhile in the late 1970s, a uniform methodology for manipulating atmospheric, hydrological and other geophysical processes was formulated on the basis of the ideas from cybernetics [2]. In this monograph the concept of geophysical cybernetics was introduced as the new area of research within the control theory. Geophysical cybernetics explores a self-regulating cybernetic system, in which the geophysical system is the control object, and the role of the controller is given to human society as a whole. The geophysical system is defined as a set of objects of inanimate nature [2]. Thus, the main components of the earth’s climate system, the atmosphere and ocean, can be considered as subsystems of the geophysical system. Geophysical cybernetics, as an interdisciplinary research area, it is currently evolving on the basis of ideas and methods of optimal control theory, dynamical systems theory, technical cybernetics, geophysics, and other academic disciplines. This paper has two main objectives. The first objective is to present a general formulation of the problem of optimal control of the geophysical system considering its uniqueness as a physical object with a number of specific features. The second objective is to consider the control problem of large-scale dynamical processes in the atmosphere and to derive the necessary optimality conditions for this problem. WSEAS TRANSACTIONS on ENVIRONMENT and DEVELOPMENT Sergei Soldatenko, Rafael Yusupov E-ISSN: 2224-3496 116 Volume 11, 2015