Free Astronomy Magazine May-June 2025

MAY-JUNE 2025 by more than 50% above the south site of the Cherenkov Telescope Array Observatory (CTAO-South). INNA would also increase air turbu- lence in the area, further degrading conditions for astronomical observa- tions, while vibrations from the proj- ect could seriously impair the functioning of some of the astro- nomical facilities, like the Extremely Large Telescope (ELT), at the Paranal Observatory. In January, ESO publicly raised the alarm about the threat posed to the world’s darkest and clearest skies, those of ESO’s Paranal Observatory, from the industrial megaproject INNA. The project — by AES Andes, a subsidiary of the US power com- pany AES Corporation — includes multiple energy and processing fa- cilities, spread over an area of more than 3000 hectares, the size of a small city. Its planned location is just a few kilometres from the Paranal telescopes. A preliminary analysis done at the time revealed that, due to its size and proximity to Paranal, the INNA project posed significant risks to as- tronomical observations. Now, a de- tailed technical analysis has con- firmed that INNA’s impact would be devastating and irreversible. Potential damages from INNA “ecological” project confirmed A n in-depth technical analysis by the European Southern Observatory (ESO) has evalu- ated the impact of the INNA megaproject on the facilities at the Paranal Observatory, Chile — and the results are alarming. The analysis reveals that INNA would increase light pollution above the Very Large Telescope (VLT) by at least 35% and by ESO Francisco Rodríguez Bárbara Ferreira