For several years, AES Andes, a subsidiary of the US-based multinational AES Corporation, had presented a plan to produce green hydrogen and ammonia in the Atacama Desert.

The process stalled in 2024 when it entered the Environmental Impact Assessment System, and since then it has accumulated a series of objections, both within and outside the country, because the plant would have been built just a few kilometers from the town of Taltal.

The problem is that Paranal Observatory, home to some of the world’s leading ground-based telescopes, including the Very Large Telescope (VLT), one of the most powerful and operated by the European Southern Observatory (ESO), is located there.

Furthermore, the Extremely Large Telescope, currently under construction there, will be the largest ever made and, according to scientists, will provide unprecedented images of the universe to better understand its history and evolution.

Atacama is famous in the world of astronomical research because, in addition to its altitude, it has some of the most pristine skies, with virtually no atmospheric gases and perfectly dark nights for observation.

The AES Andes project, known as INNA, would have a serious negative impact on these conditions for several reasons.

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