### Instruction:

Extract the cause and effect entities from the following sentence:
Early operations is defined as the period that starts when the first nontechnical facilities are accepted and continues until the observatory has reached steady-state operations

### Assistant:

VARIABLE: the observatory
CONDITION: is defined as the period
AND: and
NEGATION: until
KEYWORD: continues
EFFECT_1: Early operations is defined as the period
CAUSE_1: the first nontechnical facilities are accepted
CAUSE_2: the observatory has reached steady-state operations

