Hawaii is about to build the largest telescope in the Northern Hemisphere

After many legal battles, the huge one billion dollar telescope project was finally licensed to build on the island of Hawaii.

Despite protests by indigenous peoples, the Hawaii Supreme Court officially approved the construction of the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) project on Mauna Kea volcano, the IFL Science reported yesterday. This value of up to one billion USD is expected to be developed early next year.

TMT is expected to be set at 4,050m above Mauna Kea volcano.(Photo: Star Advertiser).

The thirty-meter telescope is the huge telescope project of the TMT International Observatory, consisting of a main mirror with a diameter of 30 m (assembled from 492 small hexagonal mirrors), a 3-wide secondary mirror, 6 m and a flat mirror for light orientation. All are placed inside a 60 m wide dome with 98 ventilation holes. When completed, TMT will become the largest and most expensive telescope in the Northern Hemisphere region.

The project is located on the top of Mauna Kea half mountain at 4,050 m above sea level, the ideal position to hunt extraterrestrial planets and study distant spaces in the universe. However, the project faces strong opposition from the people by the telescope's location as their sacred land in culture and religion.

TMT project was deployed in 2015, but the Hawaii Supreme Court is forced to revoke the construction permit before the pressure of protest of the people. The TMT International Observatory even considered moving the telescope to the Canary Islands on the Atlantic Ocean. After many legal battles, the project was finally re-granted a construction permit, for the first time since 2015.

"On behalf of the TMT International Observatory, we are grateful for the Hawaii Supreme Court ruling. Thank you to all the board members for their support throughout the process," said Henry Yang, President. The Statistics Council International Observatory TMT said in a statement.