The
High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program (
HAARP) was initiated as an
ionospheric research program jointly funded by the
U.S. Air Force, the
U.S. Navy, the
University of Alaska Fairbanks, and the
Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).
[1] It was designed and built by
BAE Advanced Technologies (BAEAT). Its original purpose was to analyze the ionosphere and investigate the potential for developing ionospheric enhancement technology for radio communications and surveillance.
[2] As a university-owned facility, HAARP is a high-power, high-frequency transmitter used for study of the ionosphere.
The most prominent instrument at HAARP is the Ionospheric Research Instrument (IRI), a high-power
radio frequency transmitter facility operating in the
high frequency (HF) band. The IRI is used to temporarily excite a limited area of the
ionosphere. Other instruments, such as a
VHF and a
UHF radar, a
fluxgate magnetometer, a digisonde (an
ionospheric sounding device), and an induction magnetometer, are used to study the physical processes that occur in the excited region.
Work on the HAARP facility began in 1993. The current working IRI was completed in 2007; its prime contractor was
BAE Systems Advanced Technologies.
[1] As of 2008, HAARP had incurred around $250 million in tax-funded construction and operating costs. In May 2014, it was announced that the HAARP program would be permanently shut down later in the year.
[3] After discussions between the parties, ownership of the facility and its equipment was transferred to the
University of Alaska Fairbanks in August 2015.
[4]
HAARP is a target of
conspiracy theorists, who claim that it is capable of
"weaponizing" weather. Commentators and scientists say that advocates of this theory are uninformed, as claims made fall well outside the abilities of the facility, if not the scope of natural science.
[5][6]
tinfoilhat 
