SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) — Chile’s Atacama Desert is one of the darkest spots on Earth, a crown jewel for astronomers who flock to study the origins of the universe in this inhospitable desert along the Pacific coast.
A rare confluence of factors makes the Atacama an ideal home for some of the world’s biggest ground-based astronomical projects — dry climate, high altitude and, crucially, isolation from the light pollution of civilization.
“It's a perfect cocktail for astronomy,” said Daniela González, executive director of the Skies of Chile Foundation, a nonprofit that defends the quality of the country’s night skies.
But that may not be the case for much longer, a group of leading scientists warned in an open letter to Chile’s government released Tuesday.
A private company is pressing ahead with plans to construct a giant renewable energy complex in sight of one of Earth’s most productive astronomical facilities — the Paranal Observatory, operated by an international consortium known as the European Southern Observatory, or ESO.
In the letter, 30 renowned international astronomers, including Reinhard Genzel, a 2020 Nobel laureate in astrophysics who conducted much of his prize-winning research on black holes with the ESO-operated telescopes in the Atacama Desert, describe the project as “an imminent threat” to humanity's ability to study the cosmos, and unlock more of its unknowns.
“The damage would extend beyond Chile’s borders, affecting a worldwide scientific community that relies on observations made at Paranal to study everything from the formation of planets to the early universe,” the letter reads.
“We are convinced that economic development and scientific progress can and must coexist to the benefit of all people in Chile, but not at the irreversible expense of one of Earth’s unique and irreplaceable windows to the universe.”
The scientists join a chorus of voices that have been urging the Chilean government to relocate the hydrogen-based fuel production plant since the plan was unveiled a year ago by AES Chile, an offshoot of the American-based multinational AES Corp.
In response to a request for comment, AES Chile said that its own technical studies showed the project would be fully compatible with astronomical observations and compliant with the Chilean government's strict regulations on light pollution.
"We encourage trust in the country’s institutional strength, which for decades has guaranteed certainty and environmental protection for multiple productive sectors," the company said.
The plan, which is still under environmental review, calls for 3,000 hectares (7,400 acres) of wind and solar energy farms, a desalination plant and a new port.
That means not only a major increase in light pollution but also new dust, ground vibrations and heightened atmospheric turbulence that blurs stars and makes them twinkle. All of that — just 3 kilometers (1.9 miles) from the Paranal Observatory’s high-powered telescopes — will mess the view of key astronomical targets and could obstruct scientific advances, experts say.
“At the best sites in the world for astronomy, stars don't twinkle. They are very stable, and even the smallest artificial turbulence would destroy these characteristics,” said Andreas Kaufer, the director of operations at ESO, which assesses that the AES project would increase light pollution by 35%.
“If the sky is becoming brighter from artificial light around us, we cannot do these observations anymore. They're lost. And, since we have the biggest and most sensitive telescopes at the best spot in the world, if they're lost for us, they're lost for everyone."
Although this controversy might be specific to Chile, home to 40% of the world’s astronomy infrastructure, the project reflects the wider tension between natural darkness and industrialization tearing at countless countries as light pollution makes the night sky about 10% brighter each year.
“Major observatories have been chased out to remote locations, and essentially now they’re chased out to some of the last remaining dark sky locations on Earth, like the Atacama Desert, the mountain peaks of Hawaii, areas around Tucson, Arizona,” said Ruskin Hartley, the executive director of DarkSky International, a Tuscon-based nonprofit founded by astronomers.
“All of them are now at risk from encroaching development and mining. It’s happening everywhere.”
DeBre reported from Buenos Aires, Argentina.
FILE - Radio antennas are spread out on the terrain as part of one of the world's largest astronomy projects, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chajnator in the Atacama desert in northern Chile, Sept. 27, 2012. (AP Photo/Jorge Saenz, File)
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Trump administration officials overseeing the immigration crackdown launched this week in New Orleans are aiming to make 5,000 arrests, a target that some city leaders who oppose the operation say is unrealistic and would require detainining more than just violent offenders.
It's an ambitious goal that would surpass the number of arrests during a two-month enforcement blitz this fall around Chicago, a region with a much bigger immigrant population than New Orleans. Records tracking the first weeks of the Chicago operation also showed most arrestees didn’t have a violent criminal record.
In Los Angeles — the first major battleground in President Donald Trump's aggressive immigration plan — roughly 5,000 people were arrested over the summer in an area where about a third of LA County's roughly 10 million residents are foreign-born.
“There is no rational basis that a sweep of New Orleans, or the surrounding parishes, would ever yield anywhere near 5,000 criminals, let alone ones that are considered ‘violent’ by any definition,” New Orleans City Council President J.P. Morrell said Thursday.
Census Bureau figures show the New Orleans metro area had a foreign-born population of almost 100,000 residents last year, and that just under 60% were not U.S. citizens.
“The amount of violent crime attributed to illegal immigrants is negligible,” Morrell said, pointing out that crime in New Orleans is at historic lows.
Violent crimes, including murders, rapes and robberies, have fallen by 12% through October compared to a year ago, from a total of 2,167 violent crimes to 1,897 this year, according to New Orleans police statistics.
Federal agents in marked and unmarked vehicles began spreading out across New Orleans and its suburbs Wednesday, making arrests in home improvement store parking lots and patrolling neighborhoods with large immigrant populations.
Alejandra Vasquez, who runs a social media page in New Orleans that reports the whereabouts of federal agents, said she has received a flood of messages, photos and video since the operations began.
“My heart is so broken,” Vasquez said. “They came here to take criminals and they are taking our working people. They are not here doing what they are supposed to do. They are taking families.”
Several hundred agents from Customs and Border Protection and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement are participating in the two-month operation dubbed “Catahoula Crunch.”
U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, who is from Louisiana, is among the state's Republicans supporting the crackdown. “Democrats’ sanctuary city policies have failed — making our American communities dangerous. The people of our GREAT city deserve better, and help is now on the ground,” Johnson posted on social media.
About two dozen protesters were removed from a New Orleans City Council meeting Thursday after chants of “Shame” broke out. Police officers ordered protesters to leave the building, with some pushed or physically carried out by officers.
Planning documents obtained last month by The Associated Press show the crackdown is intended to cover southeast Louisiana and into Mississippi.
Homeland Security Department spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said agents are going after immigrants who were released after arrests for violent crimes.
"In just 24 hours on the ground, our law enforcement officers have arrested violent criminals with rap sheets that include homicide, kidnapping, child abuse, robbery, theft, and assault,” McLaughlin said Thursday in a statement. Border Patrol and immigration officials have not responded to requests for details, including how many have been arrested so far.
She told CNN on Wednesday that "we will continue whether that will be 5,000 arrests or beyond.”
To come close to reaching their target numbers in New Orleans, immigrant rights group fear federal agents will set their sights on a much broader group.
New Orleans City councilmember Lesli Harris said “there are nowhere near 5,000 violent offenders in our region” whom Border Patrol could arrest.
“What we’re seeing instead are mothers, teenagers, and workers being detained during routine check-ins, from their homes and places of work,” Harris said. “Immigration violations are civil matters, not criminal offenses, and sweeping up thousands of residents who pose no threat will destabilize families, harm our economy.”
During the “Operation Midway Blitz” crackdown in Chicago that began in September, federal immigration agents arrested more than 4,000 people across the city and its many suburbs, dipping into Indiana.
Homeland Security officials heralded efforts to nab violent criminals, posting dozens of pictures on social media of people appearing to have criminal histories and lacking legal permission to be in the U.S. But public records tracking the first weeks of the Chicago push show most arrestees didn’t have a violent criminal record.
Of roughly 1,900 people arrested in the Chicago area from early September through the middle of October — the latest data available — nearly 300 or about 15% had criminal convictions on their records, according to ICE arrest data from the University of California Berkeley Deportation Data Project analyzed by The Associated Press.
The vast majority of those convictions were for traffic offenses, misdemeanors or nonviolent felonies, the data showed.
New Orleans, whose international flavor comes from its long history of French, Spanish, African and Native American cultures, has seen a new wave of immigrants from places in Central and South America and Asia.
Across all of Louisiana, there were more than 145,000 foreign-born noncitizens, according to the Census Bureau. While those numbers don't break down how many residents of the state were in the country illegally, the Pew Research Center estimated the number at 110,000 people in 2023.
This story has been corrected to show that about a third of LA County’s 10 million residents are foreign-born, not 10 million total.
Seewer reported from Toledo, Ohio. Associated Press journalists Sara Cline in Baton Rouge, Louisiana; Sophia Tareen in Chicago; Aaron Kessler in Washington, D.C.; and Michael Schneider in Orlando, Florida, contributed.
U.S. Border Patrol Commander at large Gregory Bovino, 1st right, walks on the street in New Orleans, La.,Wednesday, Dec. 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
U.S. Border Patrol agents stand on the street in New Orleans, La.,Wednesday, Dec. 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
U.S. Border Patrol Commander at large Gregory Bovino, 3rd left, walks on the street in New Orleans, La.,Wednesday, Dec. 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
