A Taiwanese science institute is once again seeking to build a small satellite receiver array in Ka‘u.
The Academia Sinica Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics will present at next month’s Windward Planning Commission meeting a request for a special permit to install 10 satellite dishes 20 feet in diameter, as well as additional infrastructure including a catchment tank, portable toilet and 10-kilowatt solar array across about two acres near Wood Valley.
The site of the project, located about 200 feet away from the intersection of Wood Valley Road and Makakupu Road, would be situated within a larger 10.7-acre parcel owned by prominent Big Island landowner the Edmund C. Olson Trust.
According to a report by the county Planning Department, the property currently is primarily used for ranching, which would not be significantly impacted by the project outside of the two acres used for the array site itself.
According to project documents, the array would be temporary in nature, installed for a period of up to 10 years, and ASIAA would be required to return the site to its original condition after that period ends.
The purpose of the array is to attempt to detect Fast Radio Bursts — powerful pulses of radio waves lasting only a few milliseconds that originate from deep space. Little is understood about Fast Radio Bursts, but they are estimated to release as much energy in a single millisecond as our sun emits in three days.
ASIAA Chief Scientist for Hawaii Operations Geoffrey Bower said in a statement that there are several geographic features in Ka‘u that make it the ideal site for the project.
Foremost, the mountainous terrain and isolation from population centers shields the site from significant radio interference. Because Fast Radio Bursts are only faintly observable from Earth, the site needs to be “radio-quiet” to keep the bursts from being drowned out by other radio noise.
Furthermore, the location on the Big Island makes it possible to see parts of the sky that are unobservable from other parts of the globe, which Bower said would “create the opportunity to make unique discoveries and to be the connector between FRB observatories from North America and Asia.”
Because the array is entirely focused on receiving signals, the dishes would not emit any radio waves or other noise. They also would remain in a fixed position aiming at the northeastern sky.
This is not the first attempt by ASIAA to construct the array in Ka‘u.
Last May, ASIAA submitted a request to the Windward Planning Commission to construct the array at a different site about two miles away from the current proposed location. However, ASIAA withdrew that request following a series of petitions from Wood Valley residents concerned about the project.
Those concerns were primarily that the array would disturb neighboring properties, overtax already poorly maintained roads, and go against the agricultural character of the area.
At the time, the Planning Department also recommended that the request be denied, because the proposed site had high agricultural potential, and pursuing the array would not promote the objectives of the county’s General Plan.
This time, however, the department has recommended that the request be granted. In this case, the department determined that the array would not substantially interfere with agricultural activities on the land, nor would it adversely affect surrounding properties.
According to the Planning Department’s recommendation, which was written in December, the department has so far received no testimony from Wood Valley residents regarding the project.
While the matter was to be discussed during the Windward Planning Commission’s meeting Friday, a quorum could not be reached and so the matter was postponed until next month’s meeting on Feb. 2.
Email Michael Brestovansky at mbrestovansky@hawaiitribune-herald.com.
