China’s new antenna is five times the size of New York City, but some fear it could be a cancer risk
- Work to build facility was 13 years in the making, but some researchers have expressed concern about exposure to extremely low frequency waves
- Project WEM will be able to communicate with submarines under the water, reducing need for them to surface
China has built a giant experimental radio antenna on a piece of land almost five times the size of New York City, according to researchers involved in the highly controversial project.
The Wireless Electromagnetic Method (WEM) project took 13 years to build but researchers said that it was finally ready to emit extremely low frequency radio waves, also known as ELF waves. Those waves have been linked to cancer by the World Health Organisation-affiliated International Agency for Research on Cancer.
Scientists said that its transmissions could be picked up by a submarine lurking hundreds of metres under the sea, thus reducing the vessel’s risk of having to resurface to receive transmissions.
The project follows the construction of China’s first military-grade Super Low Frequency transmission station in 2009.
The next year, a Chinese nuclear submarine successfully communicated with the station from deep water – making China the third country in the world to have established such a submarine communication system, after the United States and Russia.