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Posted at 5:38 p.m., Friday, August 5, 2005

NASA picks Keck for telescope project

Associated Press

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NASA has made a final decision to locate its $50 million outrigger telescopes project at the W.M. Keck Observatory atop Mauna Kea on the Big Island.

The project is under review and must be approved by the University of Hawaii, according to Rolf Kudritzki, director of the university's Institute for Astronomy. The process should take a few months, he said.

The project has been delayed by Native Hawaiian groups, who consider Mauna Kea sacred, and by environmentalists concerned about the endangered plants and insects that live on the dormant volcano.

Two years ago a federal judge ordered NASA to complete a full environmental impact statement after the state Office of Hawaiian Affairs sued NASA and the Institute for Astronomy, arguing the project would damage the mountain's sacred sites and fragile ecosystem. NASA released the final statement in February.

In December, a group of Hawaiians and environmental groups also filed a lawsuit in Circuit Court in Hilo, seeking to reverse the state Board of Land and Natural Resources' Oct. 29 approval of project.

The observatory at the 13,769-foot summit of Mauna Kea is already the home of the Keck I and II telescopes, the most powerful optical telescopes in the world.

Plans call for four to six 6-foot telescopes to be built in the graded parking lot of the observatory. They would work in conjunction with the twin 33-foot telescopes.

"That is really the revolutionary step forward," Kudritzki said. "The technology is called interferometry."

The large telescopes already work in tandem, making them even more powerful by combing light waves that are superimposed.

"For astronomical observations, you can do this to obtain a sharper image of the sky," Kudritzki said.

Having the large telescopes working in conjunction with the smaller telescopes "gives you a sharp image not only in one direction, but in a lot of different directions simultaneously," he said.

NASA had considered nine other sites for the outrigger project, including two other locations on Mauna Kea — the Subaru Telescope and the Gemini North Telescope.

The agency said the only reasonable alternative site was in the Canary Islands, which are located in the Atlantic Ocean off Africa.

But no alternate site matches the scientific capability of the Keck location, NASA said in its decision.

"The W.M. Keck Observatory is found to offer the highest overall scientific potential, as well as the lowest technical and programmatic risk," it said.

In its final environmental impact statement released in February, NASA said the addition of the outrigger telescopes would have a small incremental impact on the mountain's cultural resources.

The agency also said that if the project was approved, it would provide $2 million for preservation and protection of historic and cultural resources on Mauna Kea and educational needs of Hawaiians, and would also fund an ecology for the wekiu bug, a candidate for listing as an endangered species. The proposed project would displace a small amount of previously disturbed wekiu bug habitat, the environmental impact statement said.