Name of the Project
Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project.

Location
Africa and Australia.

Project Owner/s
The international SKA project is run by the UK-based SKA Organisation, which currently comprises Australia, Canada, China, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, South Africa, Sweden and the UK. India is an associate member and is expected to become a full member shortly.

The SKA Organisation formalises relationships between the international partners and centralises the leadership project.

The project in South Africa is the responsibility of a separate, local organisation, SKA SA.

Project Description
The SKA will provide one-million square metres of collecting area, which demands a revolutionary break from traditional radio-telescope design.

The project will use three types of antennas (radio-wave receptors) – dishes, midfrequency aperture arrays and low-frequency aperture arrays – to provide continuous frequency coverage from 70 MHz to 10 GHz. Combining the signals from the antennas will create a telescope with a collecting area equivalent to a dish with an area of about 1 km2.

The first phase of the SKA, known as SKA1, will result in the creation of two complementary instruments, one each in South Africa and Australia.

The South African instrument, known as SKA1_Mid, will comprise about 200 dishes and operate in the 350 MHz to 14 GHz frequency range. The Australian instrument, known as SKA1–Low, will comprise more than 100 000 (perhaps as many as 130 000) dipole antennas and will operate in the 50 MHz to 350 MHz frequency range.

SKA1–Mid will include the 64 dishes of the South African precursor to the SKA, the MeerKAT radio telescope array, being built in the Karoo region. Australia’s precursor, the Australian SKA Pathfinder (better known as Askap and already in operation) will serve as surveying instrument for the SKA.

The central regions, in Australia and in South Africa, will contain cores, each 5 km in diameter – one for each antenna type. Fifty per cent of the collecting area will be within the central cores. The aperture array antennas will extend to about 200 km from the core regions. In Africa, the dishes will be positioned at distant stations that are 3 000 km from the core regions.

The construction of the SKA will be phased.

Phase 1 (SKA1) will comprise about 10% of the array and will include dishes and low-frequency aperture arrays.

The Australian SKA Pathfinder and South Africa’s Meerkat precursor dishes will be incorporated in the SKA1. The Murchison Widefield Array, located at the Australia site, is another precursor telescope to the SKA.

Phase 2 (SKA2) will extend the array with midfrequency aperture arrays and further dishes.

All the dishes for SKA2 will be located in Africa. All the low-frequency aperture arrays will be located in Australia and all the midfrequency aperture arrays will be built in Southern Africa.

The phased construction of the telescope will mean that the SKA can start operating before construction is completed.

Potential Job Creation
More than 1 000 engineers and scientists in 20 countries have been involved in designing the SKA over the past five years, with new research programmes and educational initiatives and collaborations being created in various countries to train the next generation of space scientists and engineers.

Capital Expenditure
SKA1 is expected to cost €650-million (about R8.9-billion).

Planned Start /End Date
Construction of the first phase of the SKA is expected to start in 2021.

Latest Developments
The South African Radio Astronomy Observatory (Sarao) has announced that the Integrated Environmental Management Plan (IEMP) for the Phase 1 of the SKA midfrequency array (SKA1_Mid) was gazetted recently by Environmental Affairs Minister Nomvula Mokonyane.

This is the first IEMP to be adopted at the national level in South Africa. It is required under the National Environmental Management Act and sets out a consolidated plan that covers environmental monitoring and control actions, long-term research programmes monitoring the SKA site in the Karoo region, and the minimum construction and operation requirements for the SKA1_Mid.

The IEMP has followed soon after the signing of the SKA Convention (and the forming of the intergovernmental organisation) and one month after the approval of the detailed design of the infrastructure and power for the SKA in South Africa.

The strategic environmental assessment (SEA) was undertaken by the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, under the guidance of a special advisory committee. “The SEA assessed the potential impacts that the proposed activities for the construction and operation of the SKA1_MID may have on local agriculture, heritage (including archaeology, palaeontology, cultural heritage and visual/landscape aspects), terrestrial ecology and biodiversity, including avifauna, aquatic ecosystems and socioeconomic aspects,” Sarao has said in a statement.

The committee included representatives of relevant government departments  and agencies. There were also consultations with important sectors such as civil aviation, defence and conservation agencies, as well as with provincial and local governments. “Further aspects of sensitivity in terms of aviation, defence, telecommunications, weather services, mining, water use, waste management, noise and traffic effects were also investigated in consultation with the relevant authorities and stakeholders,” Sarao has assured.

The SEA was conducted over three years. The area studied was subdivided into the SEA core study area, of 38 land parcels amounting to about131 200 ha; and the SEA Spiral arm study area, comprising 131 land parcels, encompassing about 497 000 ha. The total land area covered by the SEA was about 628 200 ha, spread across the Kareeberg, Hantam, Siyatemba and Karoo-Hoogland municipalities. The largest towns around the SEA areas are Brandvlei, Carnarvon, Van Wyksvlei and Williston.

The strategic assessment programme included specialist reports, which were reviewed by independent experts (who also contributed to improving the process). These reports resulted in specialist findings and recommendations.

Contracts for the construction for Phase 1 of the SKA will begin to be awarded from late next year. These contracts will have a total value close of €700-million. The intergovernmental treaty – the SKA Convention – which formally established the international body that will oversee the construction and operation of the SKA, the SKA Observatory, was signed in February (in alphabetical order) by Australia, China, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, South Africa and the UK. India and Sweden plan to sign soon. Further countries may sign in due course.

Key Contracts and Suppliers
South Africa: Neotel/Broadband Infraco joint venture, or JV (bandwidth network); Eskom (electricity); Telkom (telecommunications); and Nokia Siemens Networks, Intel, Seacom, Dimension Data, Microsoft and IBM (connectivity support).

On Budget and on Time?
The project is reportedly on course.

Contact Details for Project Information
SKA South Africa head communication and stakeholder relations Lorenzo Raynard, cell +27 71 454 0658 or email lraynard@ska.ac.za.