The primary goals of the Houston Environmental Aerosol Thunderstorm (HEAT) project in 2005 is to examine the effects of (1) pollution, (2) the urban heat island, and (3) the complex coastline, on storms and lightning characteristics in the Houston area. A complete description of the program is found at the following web address: http://www.met.tamu.edu/ciams/heat/index.html The cloud-to-ground lightning is enhanced by approximately 50% over Houston and downwind of the urban area. It has been proposed that the increased concentration of aerosols, such as in polluted areas, results ina narrower cloud droplet spectra, deeper mixed phase region in the cloud, additional charge separation in this region, and enhanced lightning downwind of the aerosol sources. The HEAT project will examine several aspects of this hypothesis including the effects of background aerosol concentration on storm development and total (CG and IC) lightning enhancement.