The Chariot site is located in the Ogotoruk Valley in the Cape Thompson region of northwest Alaska. This region is about 125 miles north of (inside) the Arctic Circle and is bounded on the southwest by the Chukchi Sea. The closest populated areas are the Inupiat villages of Point Hope, 32 miles northwest of the site, and Kivalina,41 miles to the southeast. The site is accessible from Point Hope by ATV in the summer and by snowmobile in the winter. Project Chariot was part of the Plowshare Program, created in 1957 by the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), a predecessor agency of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), to study peaceful uses for atomic energy. Project Chariot began in 1958 when a scientific field team chose Cape Thompson as a potential site to excavate a harbor using a series of nuclear explosions. AEC, with assistance from other agencies, conducted more than40 pretest bioenvironmental studies of the Cape Thompson area between 1959 and 1962; however, the Plowshare Program work at the Project Chariot site was cancelled because of strong public opposition. No nuclear explosions were conducted at the site.