Civil Engineering April 2021 | Vol 29 No 3

In partnership with OptiPower, Concor has been awarded the R202 million infrastruc- ture project that will allow the addition of 24 dishes to the 64 dish MeerKAT radio telescope. Located in a remote area of the Northern Cape, MeerKAT was launched in 2018 and is a precursor facility to the next-generation radio telescope, the Square Kilometre Array (SKA). The scope of Concor’s work will include a construction camp for about 250 people, 40 km of gravel access roads to the dish positions where the antenna platforms will be constructed, and the structural concrete foundations for the 24 telescope dishes. The camp will include facilities for wastewater and sewage treatment, settling ponds, water storage and security fencing. Concor will also build four guard- houses, which will be powered by solar energy. OptiPower will carry out the electrification of the works and the provision of fibre connectivity to the new installation with approximately 60 km of trenching, electrical power cables, fibre ducting, and fibre cables required. The Concor-OptiPower venture will also design a further 109 satellite foundations, with the associated roads, power, and fibre installation. RFI CHALLENGE “A key constraint of this current project is the need to limit any radio frequency interference (RFI) in the vicinity of the MeerKAT telescope array. This is due to the highly sensitive nature of the radio telescope equipment, which is designed to detect extremely weak radio signals from astrophysical sources,” says Joe Nell, Concor’s contracts director. RFI from manmade radio signals emanating from commonly used equipment like cellular phones, vehicle electronics, microwave ovens and many more can easily distort or corrupt weaker Space-age challenge at MeerKAT Scientists will soon gain even further insights into the evolution of galaxies in the universe as the MeerKAT telescope array is expanded. 54 April 2021  Civil Engineering The existing MeerKAT radio telescope (Credit: South African Radio Astronomy Observatory) 24 new dishes will be added to the 64 dish MeerKAT radio telescope (Credit: South African Radio Astronomy Observatory)