MPE Director Reinhard Genzel and German Federal President Steinmeier visit threatened telescope site in Chile
 

Federal President of Germany, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, accompanied by a delegation including Reinhard Genzel, Nobel Prize winner and Director of the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics, visited the European Southern Observatory's Paranal Observatory in Chile and the construction site of the Extremely Large Telescope. The latter will be the largest optical and infrared telescope in the world. It will investigate, among other science goals, the atmospheres of distant Earth-like planets and search for signs of life beyond Earth. However, some of the planned research objectives could be prevented by an industrial plant that is to be built not far from the observatories. The light and air pollution from the plant would affect the previously uniquely clear view into space.

Genzel and MPE have been associated with the Paranal for decades. With Gravity, they provided a crucial instrument with which the four 8-meter telescopes of ESO's Very Large Telescope VLT can be connected to form a large, virtual telescope. This technology enabled the observations that led to the discovery of the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way, for which Reinhard Genzel was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2020.

An upgrade is currently being installed at the VLT with Gravity+, which is also being developed under the leadership of MPE. With adaptive optics, laser guide stars and an extended wide-angle field of view, even deeper views into the universe are to be realized.

The MPE is also playing an important role in ESO's future mega-project, the Extremely Large Telescope ELT. With the 6-meter-high camera MICADO, the institute is delivering one of the two main instruments for the ELT, which will be roughly the size of the Colosseum in Rome when it is completed in a few years' time.

Research site under threat

The Paranal Observatory is therefore a world-leading location for cutting-edge astronomical research - but its future is under acute threat. Just a few kilometers from the ELT and VLT, the US energy supplier AES Corporation is planning to build a large-scale industrial facility covering more than 3,000 hectares - an area roughly equivalent to the city of Garching! The plans include a port, various production facilities for ammonia and hydrogen and thousands of power generators. 

If the project is implemented as planned, astronomical observations would no longer be possible due to the resulting light pollution. After all, the location at an altitude of over 2,500 meters was not chosen by chance, as the Atacama Desert with its clear, dark skies is one of the last remote places in the world and therefore offers ideal conditions for cutting-edge astronomical research.

All of the institutions working at Paranal are therefore pleading for the project to be relocated: “I hope that we can talk to the AES Corporation and find a reasonable compromise,” says Reinhard Genzel. The company's site would only have to be moved a few kilometers, “and then the problem would be solved”. This is not a dispute between science and technology, he emphasizes. Instead, the aim is to ensure that observations can continue to be made at Paranal in the future.

In this context, the visit by Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier also had a political aspect. The participating research institutions are hoping for support from the German government.

Steinmeier himself was impressed by the Paranal and described it as a “magical place”. In a press address, he emphasized the importance of the observatory for cooperation between Chile and Germany. “We are proud that German scientists are participating in this cutting-edge research. If this research is to be maintained at this level, then this location must also be permanently protected from light emissions from other sources.”

 

For Reinhard Genzel, however, the visit to the VLT was not the only appointment during his trip to South America. The day before, he had already made a visit to the University of Chile in the capital Santiago de Chile. At an event organized by the German Embassy, he gave a lecture to representatives of the German diplomatic corps and numerous prominent international researchers, in which he discussed the latest advances in research into supermassive black holes, the development of state-of-the-art telescopes and Chile's fundamental role as a world astronomical center. Moreover, Genzel received the Rector's Medal of the University of Chile “in recognition of his invaluable contributions to science and closer collaboration with the Chilean astronomical community”.