In 2003, the Chilean Ministry of National Assets, through Presidential Decree, granted a concession of state land to the design and construction of Project ALMA. The land concession encompassed the territory of the Chajnantor Plateau, located 5,000 meters above sea level in the Antofagasta Region of Chile’s Atacama Desert. The land concession has a lifespan of 50 years, after which ALMA would either apply to renew its diplomatic ‘lease’ of the land, or return the land back to its natural state through complete removal of its facilities. ALMA, currently the world’s largest radio telescope array, is part of a transformation of the northern Chilean economy, historically centered on industrial mining and now expanding into international astronomy. The region’s high altitude and dry climate provide ideal conditions for cosmic observation, ALMA, now with a newly constructed fiber optic cable that connected to its offices in Santiago, is projecting towards a future where the facilities are operated remotely, off-site. ALMA, alone with other observatories in the region, has also become a significant site of tourism in recent years.
The ALMA preserve resides within a larger state-designated territory, the Atacama la Grande Indigenous Development Area (ADI). Established in 1997, the ADI was a diplomatic response to the demands made by the region’s indigenous community, the Atacamenos, for the recognition and support of the cultural and ritual value of their ancestral territory, as well as the protection of ecological systems and native flora and fauna species.
ALMA’s infrastructural impact on the landscape reaches far beyond the borders of the scientific preserve. In 2015, ALMA completed construction of its Optical Link Project, a 400km long fiber optic communication infrastructure that physically connects ALMA’s Atacama antennas to the coastal city of Antofagasta, then extending south to Santiago, where it splices into a global network of fiber optical cables that transfer archives of mined astronomical data to ALMA’s three regional centers in the North America, Europe and Japan. The desert is now plugged in.
ALMA’s fiber optic link, buried in an artificial trench that laces across the desert landscape, performs as a conduit of scientific extraction, transferring gigabytes of data mined from the Atacama skies every day. On the Chajnantor Plateau, ALMA’s constructed footprint of fiber optics, concrete antenna foundations, and access roads overlays over existing natural and cultural systems that have been in place for millennia. For the Atacameno people, the seeming emptiness and scarcity of the plateau is abundant with natural and spiritual life.
There is now urgency to monitor, manage and preserve these precious water systems and the flora and fauna that depend on them.
Atacama Desert, Chile - Spring 2019
Student: Kevin Marblestone
Advisor: Maya Shapova
