The European Southern Observatory (ESO) plans to build the largest optical/infrared telescope in the world. The European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) will be a 39.3-metre segmented-mirror telescope situated on Cerro Armazones in northern Chile, close to ESO's Paranal Observatory. With the start of operations planned for early in the next decade, the E-ELT will address many of the most pressing unsolved questions in astronomy.