I'm glad this got pushed through - environmentalists in Hawaii can be an interesting bunch, and often choose to blockade things that are high profile simply to

I'm glad this got pushed through - environmentalists in Hawaii can be an interesting bunch, and often choose to blockade things that are high profile simply to get their message out, even if the ecological impact is highly minimal. A great example of this in the past was the Hawaii Superferry[1], which was blockaded by environmentalists who said that it would damage the reef. Which while it might be true, standard shipping freighters already travelled the same route and had a higher ecological impact than the lighter dual-hulled ferry, which would have taken a lot of the shipping volume of the more damaging ships. By blocking the ferry, the environmentalists got a lot of publicity, but ultimately the reef ended up suffering more as the ferry got shut down. With this, the ecological impact will be highly minimal (based on the impact of the existing observatory and the environmental studies done after the plans were drawn up), but it's very high profile so a natural target for them. I'm very glad that the court pushed it through as they had no data to back up their claims that that it would pollute the mountain. The claim that it interfered with traditional and cultural practices has some merit, but that's only because the entire mountain of Mauna Kea is considered sacred - nothing about the peak itself is special. Also, there's already a ton of observatories up there[2], so it wouldn't be changing the status quo in any way. Overall I personally saw their protests as more political than based on arguments with merit. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawaii_Superferry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawaii_Superferry [2] https://i.imgur.com/7TjQd52.png https://i.imgur.com/7TjQd52.png