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World's darkest and clearest skies at risk from industrial megaproject

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Re: World's darkest and clearest skies at risk from industrial megaproject

#21

Post by dheera »

I did a bunch of astrophotography in the Atacama desert last year, it was an absolutely phenomenal place. There are a lot of celestial objects you cannot image from the northern hemisphere and there aren't many other places in the southern hemisphere with weather conditions that good (maybe Namibia but it doesn't have the altitude advantage).

The only thing I wish is that some of the parks would be open after dark to shoot landscapes. Most of the parks closed before sunset, so I had to mostly image from roadsides, which was kind of sad.

Re: World's darkest and clearest skies at risk from industrial megaproject

#22

Post by ggm »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #20
ggm wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the goods made will be sold to American consumers directly and indirectly and are priced to reflect all kinds of costs including EPA compliance in domestic markets. European markets also demand European norms to labour and health and environment are met, even if tokenistically. To some it is a form of protectionism. It's also the "why can't we make it here" reasoning. If you tried to make it in the US it woul…

Ammonia and hydrogen are essentially energy export mechanisms. They'll be exported to energy poor places, aka Asia, not America. they can and are made in America without fanfare. You wouldn't have states fighting to exlude green hydrogen or ammonia plants, you'd have states competing on how many subsidies they could give them.

Arguably, very likely true. But the fertiliser (the other ammonia product, the one we do mostly now the others being somewhat futurological) will I am sure sell worldwide. I'm personally sceptical about the hydrogen economy I can't see it working. It's biggish in some Australian circles, both because of IPR around the processes and people in related fields looking at uses for surplus solar power. Twiggy Forrest was big in it, wanted the sun cable proposal to pivot over, its partly why the JV with Cannon Brookes fell apart.

My comment was to the more general "why can't we have nice things" about industrial placement. I spent time in Culpeper and the number of "no more Datacentre" signs were amazing. Old folks who retired to the country don't want them build nearby. It's a large federal and private investment in tech services. And growing.

Re: World's darkest and clearest skies at risk from industrial megaproject

#23

Post by [deleted] »

ggm wrote: post #13
WorkerBee28474 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The telescopes are 8,000 miles south of America. Why does American policy matter?

Because the goods made will be sold to American consumers directly and indirectly and are priced to reflect all kinds of costs including EPA compliance in domestic markets. European markets also demand European norms to labour and health and environment are met, even if tokenistically. To some it is a form of protectionism. It's also the "why can't we make it here" reasoning. If you tried to make it in the US it woul…

[deleted]

Re: World's darkest and clearest skies at risk from industrial megaproject

#24

Post by a1j9o94 »

WorkerBee28474 wrote: post #8
darthoctopus wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why is this downvoted? the specific cities (notably in Arizona) that have taken deliberate action on this are exceptions proving the general rule that light pollution is demonstrably less of a policy concern even compared to the notorious American disdain for walkable infrastructure.

The telescopes are 8,000 miles south of America. Why does American policy matter?

It's also an American company building the project. The cultural values of the US are relevant.

Re: World's darkest and clearest skies at risk from industrial megaproject

#25

Post by kortilla »

hackingonempty wrote: post #2

If you were wondering if there was any issue even less important to Americans than the lives of pedestrians and cyclists, it is dark skies.

Disagree. Or at least it’s a different set of people generally very supportive of dark skies.

There are many dark sky communities in the southwest that are otherwise standard car centric unwalkable american towns.

Re: World's darkest and clearest skies at risk from industrial megaproject

#26

Post by ok_dad »

returningfory2 wrote: post #18
ok_dad wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You think a port and industrial plant that requires 3/4 of a gigawatt of electricity will be built within a limit of less than 4000m from the ocean port? Every port I’ve seen took at least a few kilometers of inland space. I also don’t think a few kilometers makes much of a difference to the light reduction, basically any light at all will harm the telescope. I am surprised at the “meh” response from the commenters h…

The problem is that, remarkably, there’s always a reason not to build. A different site in Chile will probably have some obscure species of beetle, or rocks that someone has interpreted as an Indigenous site, or some minor highway that can’t handle the traffic, etc etc etc, so that we can’t build there either.

Well then I guess we’ve run out of land!

Re: World's darkest and clearest skies at risk from industrial megaproject

#27

Post by dylan604 »

It’s not just industrial sites. My “local” (4 hours away) dark sky spot is constantly battling light pollution. There’s an industrial complex that’s made an agreement to turn their lights off at midnight. They’ve made deals with the county to replace the lighting to be dark sky friendly, but they still have private land owners that refuse to cooperate and replace their lighting. I have many images of the Milky Way with ranch lights dotting horizon.

Re: World's darkest and clearest skies at risk from industrial megaproject

#28

Post by modeless »

culi wrote: post #17
thereisnospork wrote: post #5

BANANAs in action, can't even build a green energy facility in the literal middle of nowhere without complaints.

This isn't just about getting rid of the last place on earth you can sometimes get a truly dark sky. This is about progress itself > Since its inauguration in 1999, Paranal Observatory, built and operated by the European Southern Observatory (ESO), has led to significant astronomy breakthroughs, such as the first image of an exoplanet and confirming the accelerated expansion of the Universe. The Nobel Prize in Physic…

It's not literally the last place on Earth with dark skies. It's just one place with dark skies where they built a telescope. This isn't about protecting the sky and it's not about "progress", it's about protecting an investment of money in a telescope.

The price of launching giant telescopes to space is set to plummet in the next few years with Starship and New Glenn coming online. IMO we should be focusing on that rather than blocking development on Earth to preserve previous investments in ground based telescopes.

Re: World's darkest and clearest skies at risk from industrial megaproject

#29

Post by kortilla »

Headline is dramatic but misleading. Essentially the entire 7/10 of the planet in the ocean has skies as dark as this. Clarity significantly reduces the footprint, but there are massive chunks of mountain ranges untouched by human development in both hemispheres that would be just as clear as here.

If clear skies are important enough to block a new development, they should just unlock some land in the Himalayas or Rockies to replace this observatory.

Re: World's darkest and clearest skies at risk from industrial megaproject

#30

Post by niccl »

kortilla wrote: post #29

Headline is dramatic but misleading. Essentially the entire 7/10 of the planet in the ocean has skies as dark as this. Clarity significantly reduces the footprint, but there are massive chunks of mountain ranges untouched by human development in both hemispheres that would be just as clear as here. If clear skies are important enough to block a new development, they should just unlock some land in the Himalayas or Ro…

who pays for moving the observatory?
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