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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

#81

Post by chrisandchris »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #75
Daub wrote: post #40

When I lived in the Welsh countryside, there were occasional nights where I could not see my hand in front of my face. The requirements were that it was new moon, and that there was slight fog. We also lived deep in a valley, which helped. I had great fun navigating my way to the local pub in complete darkness. The odd thing is that when I recount that experience, some people refuse to believe me. Of course they are…

I've experienced that once in a simulated environment; there's a museum in Nijmegen that has an indoor setup to simulate being completely blind, you get a stick and a guide and have to navigate a living room and the like. Can recommend if you're interested in accessibility and the like!

In Switzerland, there are two restaurants called "Blinde Kuh" (blind cow), where it's completely dark and you'll get served by blind/visually impaired people. There even work visually impaired people in the kitchen (besides "regular" seing people). It's a fascinating wxperience.

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

#82

Post by Enk1du »

oefrha wrote: post #46
aragilar wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The plan of "don't build a major industrial centre 5km from the best site for optical astronomy in the world, build it somewhere else" seems like a perfect viable one to me.

Well, local people probably care about economic development and don’t give a rat’s ass about astronomy. So the question becomes, who’s going to compensate for the loss of economic development? (By local I don’t mean strictly local, in case of counter arguments along the line that there are no/very few local people to begin with.) Disclosure: I’m a former physicist and I have personally operated an optical telescope w…

At Las Campanas, most of the staff from the cooks to the techs and a number of the researchers were all local. I found quite a bit of interest in the country as a whole as it's a source of national pride being the best location for astronomy.

Allowing this to proceed will affect _all_ future astronomy projects in Chile. No one is going to splash out on a shiny, new 100m optical telescope (OWL) if anyone can come along and park a city's worth of light just down the road.

https://www.eso.org/sci/facilities/eelt/owl/

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

#83

Post by ungreased0675 »

cubefox wrote: post #54
WorkerBee28474 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Would it be unthinkable to just NOT have bright lights pointed at the sky all night? That's possible, and directed/shielded lighting is commercially available. However, the project's critics have already said that no plan the project comes up with will be good enough - “Even if [AES] do a perfect job, using perfect lights that probably don’t even exist and perfect shielding, there will be an impact and that will be…

> That's possible, and directed/shielded lighting is commercially available. Given the size of the site (over 3000 hectares), even lights purely pointed at the ground will still create large amounts of bounce lighting. The ground reflects light up in the sky.

It’s possible to go more restrictive than shielded lights. What if all outdoor lights must be turned off from 9pm to 5am? If the conditions were something like that, would the developers still want to build?

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

#86

Post by bburnett44 »

otteromkram wrote: post #53
bongodongobob wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty fucked up to say that people that don't have dark skies even on their radar with everything going on right now are heartless and lacking empathy. It shows a gross misunderstanding of the average person today and really shows your lack of empathy. I shoot astro, I love it. I wish skies were darker. But I certainly don't blame my comrades for not giving two fucks about how the sky looks when they are asleep afte…

"...when they are asleep after working two jobs to pay rent." No one else sleeps or works, right? Plus, who knows why they work more than one job. Maybe they were "too smart" for school, found out later that they weren't, and now are grasping to close the gap due to hubris and ignorance early on in their life. No shame in making up for lost time/wages, but that's not our fault and we shouldn't have to constantly bend…

This is a pretty crazy comment

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

#87

Post by saddat »

thereisnospork wrote: post #11
ok_dad wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s an industrial plant with an attached power plant, it’s not like families will be using this power.

How is it you think families get power, goods, and services? Ammonia makes fertilizer - this plant will help feed millions, dropping food costs. Even if the power this plant is generating won't go directly to families, it will be going into the things they eat and the things they buy in place of power they can use directly.

Again, not much use for the locals at this elevation . That’s super dry area

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

#88

Post by II2II »

ungreased0675 wrote: post #83
cubefox wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's possible, and directed/shielded lighting is commercially available. Given the size of the site (over 3000 hectares), even lights purely pointed at the ground will still create large amounts of bounce lighting. The ground reflects light up in the sky.

It’s possible to go more restrictive than shielded lights. What if all outdoor lights must be turned off from 9pm to 5am? If the conditions were something like that, would the developers still want to build?

I suspect the real concern is there would be a push to relax the restrictions once the industrial facility has been built. Astronomical observatories have faced such problems in the past, to the point where research goals had to be fundamentally altered or where they ceased to be research facilities.

That said, if the goal is to reduce the lighting to the point where it has no impact, one has to ask: what is the point of having lighting at all? I suppose lighting could be restricted to indoor use only, but most commercial operations will expect some outdoor lighting.

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

#89

Post by Oarch »

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…

Sure. But building a stable platform out there?

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

#90

Post by justlikereddit »

ungreased0675 wrote: post #83
cubefox wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's possible, and directed/shielded lighting is commercially available. Given the size of the site (over 3000 hectares), even lights purely pointed at the ground will still create large amounts of bounce lighting. The ground reflects light up in the sky.

It’s possible to go more restrictive than shielded lights. What if all outdoor lights must be turned off from 9pm to 5am? If the conditions were something like that, would the developers still want to build?

Have you ever seen a heavy construction site involving land preparation? Like a new road being built?

Dust everywhere. Backhoes with 360 light coverage that makes a lighthouse envious. Trucks, trucks everywhere! Floodlights! String lights! Crane lights! Temporary light poles! Service lights! Warning lights! A dictionary of lights!

Can they work in the dark without producing so much dust? Can a tiger be a vegan?

Also the development is part wind power, this alone causes wake turbulence. So even if regulation demanded complete blackout after sunset on the penalty to of death the observational quality is still permanently degraded.

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