Category Archives: Government

Community, Government, Mauna Kea

What We Are For

Something interesting is starting to happen.

The Governor has been giving speeches using what happened here on the Big Island – residents turning out to support the Thirty Meter Telescope – as an example.

In a recent speech, Governor Lingle said:

“In our time it seems to be that people are real quick to tell you what they’re against and what they don’t want, but they don’t seem to be able to articulate a clear vision for what we do want. What are we for? And then put at least as much effort behind what we’re for as behind what we’re against.”

Lee Cataluna wrote yesterday, in her Honolulu Advertiser column, about that recent Lingle speech:

[Lingle] used the example of Hilo residents demonstrating in support of a new Thirty Meter Telescope. They held signs for what they wanted. “Picture this: The community coming out on the street, not for something they were against, but something they were for … They got the telescope. They’re building that bright future for the kids there on the Big Island.

We thought we’d rerun our post from June 15, 2009, to show what she’s talking about:

***

It was a coalition of folks from all sectors of the population that came to wave signs the other day.

Signs1
It’s about the keiki. Kumiko S. Usuda, Outreach Scientist (Astronomer) at the Subaru Telescope, and her children.

June & Dina
June Ha and Dina

Signs3
It’s not about us. It’s about future generations. This is Suzy Dill and her future generation.

Signs4
Pete Lindsey and the boys

Signs5
Waiakea High School Robotics club

Signs6
UH Hilo Astronomy/Physics Professor Marianne Takamiya and family

Signs7
left, Barbara Hastings, Outgoing President of the Hawaii Island Chamber of Commerce; center, Incoming President Mary Begier

It is not about us anymore. Now it is about the keiki and future
generations. It was very gratifying to see high school students, young kids, a hapai mom – the next generations.

The Labor Union and business folks were there, too. Jobs are about families and the here and now.

The Big Island Labor Alliance played an important role. The labor folks tell me that there are by far more Hawaiian workers on the bench now than all the people who testified on both sides of the issue at the Comprehensive Management Plan hearing recently. They wonder why their voices are not heard.

There were educators there, too, who think about the value of new learning.

It was uplifting to hear all the people blowing their horns in support. It was louder this time than last. All kinds of different sounds — especially raucous were the big rigs and their air horns!

Eating Locally, Government

Act 175, New Procurement Law

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The Honolulu Advertiser ran an article – Hawaii law may hurt farmers; Bid process could bring more outside competition – last week. It talks about Act 175, the new law that requires state agencies to gather competitive bids before buying food and other agricultural products.

Although there was a preference for local agricultural products in the previous law, the Hawaii Administrative Rules exempted local products from the law that required open competition, transparency of government purchasing practices, and additional preferences such as small business ones.

The state could have chosen to give preference to local produce with this new law; they just chose not to.

From the Advertiser article:

While the intent of the law is to support local growers, not all officials are convinced that will be the effect….Competitive procurement is expected to draw more Mainland competition, even with the 15 percent advantage given to local growers.

Farmers are incredulous. Prior to enactment of Act 175, state agencies purchased very little from local farmers. What’s to lose?

“If … it becomes a competitive process, we’re not sure exactly what the effect would be – whether it would be positive or negative, because nobody has any experience with that,” said state Agriculture Director Sandra Lee Kunimoto. “But the farm bureau and the farmers felt it was worth trying to see if it would increase the purchase of local goods.”

State Procurement Office Administrator Aaron Fujioka agreed. “It didn’t have to be competed, and it could be all purchased local from local companies locally grown,” Fujioka said. “The prior exemptions allowed agencies, if they chose, to purchase only from local companies and locally grown fresh produce and meats. They could have done that. Now that choice is no longer available. It has to go through a formal, more structured process.”

State agencies could have chosen to buy local produce, but they all chose not to. Out of 650 Big Island Farm Bureau members, I know of only one who sells to state agencies – and she has to go through a third party. Hawai‘i farmers know it is impossible to get produce into the schools and other state agencies.

We farmers welcome a formal, more structured process. But this time we want to help structure that process.

According to the state Procurement Office, state agencies purchased $6.63 million of fresh meat and produce from November 2005 through January 2009. The average award was about $7,400. The top three suppliers during that period in terms of dollar volume of sales were Love’s Bakery ($907,813), Meadow Gold Dairies ($511,295) and Mikilua Poultry Farm ($500,000). The top three suppliers in terms of number of awards were: Ham Produce (162), Hilo Products (133) and Armstrong Local Produce (132).

Procurement Office data suggest that most fresh food and produce purchased by state agencies came from local wholesalers and retailers. What isn’t clear is whether those local firms acquired their produce from local farms.

That is exactly the problem. It’s as if the state procurement office is saying: “Since we are buying from a local wholesaler, it must be local produce.” Farmers just shake their heads and go back to farming.

Farmers have known for years that the system is broken. There is no data to show how much of the state procurement is locally grown foods. How would the state know if their policy of “supporting local” is working?

The state says, “We support local farmers.” Farmers think, “It’s not what you say; it’s what you do.”

Farmers shake their heads. We know that the more fresh vegetables we import, the more inspectors we need and the higher the risk of invasive species.  We have more endangered species here in Hawai‘i than in the whole rest of the United States.

“The Big Island farm bureau polled their members, and they’ve got 650 members – and they only had one producer selling on a regular basis to the state and one who shipped their first shipment this year,” Connally said. “Their sense was their products were not going into the state facilities.

“If the farmers see that there’s a steady market available, then they can produce for that market.”

It’s what I keep saying: “If the farmers make money, the farmers will farm.”

Food security; the dangers of exporting our economy because of rising oil prices; protecting our endangered species – when we are truly supporting local farmers, we are addressing all of these concerns.

The world has changed and we no longer have the luxury of bumbling along. For the sake of future generations, we need to get serious.

Farmers understand this very clearly. This is not rocket science.

Farmers who are interested in helping push implementation forward can contact their legislators, the governor’s office and the state procurement office.

It may not be in the farmer’s nature to be vocal, but we need to make some noise.

Food Security, Government

Department of Ag Layoffs, & Priorities

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It was standing room only at the Aupuni Center last night at a meeting held to discuss the announced Department of Agriculture layoffs.

The meeting was called by Senators Russell Kokubun and Dwight Takamine. In attendance were Mayor Billy Kenoi, Senator Gary Hooser, and Representatives Clift Tsuji, Bob Herkes, Faye Hanohano and Jerry Chang.

Many people talked about the effects on specific operations. For example, the cut in the pesticide branch will mean less timely inspections of violations, and less monitoring of the spread of the Varoa mites, which could be devastating to the honey bee industry. There will be less monitoring and eradication of the Banana Bunchy Top virus, which has the potential to devastate the Big Island banana industry. The papaya industry relies on state inspectors to vouch for the proper operation of quarantine measures, which is crucial for our papaya industry to survive and prosper.

The Plant Quarantine department works to prevent unwanted pests coming in on produce and other agricultural goods. It is anticipated that produce will not be inspected on a timely basis, and therefore unwanted pests will slip in.

Many folks testified about how the cutback will hurt the local agricultural community.

I testified from a global perspective on behalf of the state Farm Bureau, of which I am Treasurer. I said that the world has changed forever and it is not business as usual. I said that the world oil supply is depleting faster than we are able to find new sources of oil. The consequence will be higher and higher oil prices and shrinking discretionary income as we export our economy to buy oil. We are not going to back to the good old days of exponential growth. We need to be prepared for a new normal.

The Department of Agriculture supports the export of agriculture products, and it supports the production of locally grown produce. Its budget is only .03% of the State budget; just a tiny amount.

I asked if we should not consider reprioritizing. Exporting products counters the export of our economy to buy foreign oil. And there is nothing more important than eating.

We know that Food Security requires that farmers produce food. And if a farmer makes money, the farmer will farm.

Big Island, Food Security, Government, Renewable Energy Sources, Water

Hawai‘i to Become a “Better Place”

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Do you know about Better Place coming to Hawai‘i?

Better Place is working to build an electric car network, using technology available today. Our goals? Sustainable transportation, global energy independence and freedom from oil.

Shai Agassi is founder and CEO of Better Place, and in the following video he talks about his mission. His company has a plan to take entire countries oil-free by 2020.

From ted.com: Agassi stunned the software industry in 2007 by  resigning from SAP to focus on his vision for breaking the world’s fossil-fuel habit, a cause he had championed since his fuse was lit at a Young Global Leaders conference in 2005. Through his enthusiastic persistence, Agassi’s startup Better Place has signed up some impressive partners — including Nissan-Renault and the countries
of Israel and Denmark.

Electric vehicles for our transportation needs are starting to come into focus. Better Place has announced that it is partnering with Hawai‘i to make mass adoption of electric vehicles powered by renewable energy a reality in the state by 2012.

From Better Place:

The state’s partnership with Better Place will play a significant role in the economic growth of Hawaii and will serve as a model for the rest of the U.S. for how green technology infrastructure can fuel job creation. The implementation of electric infrastructure will reignite the Hawaii economy with local jobs, while creating a model for renewable energy growth. It will also expose the millions of annual visitors to Hawaii to the real possibilities of life with clean energy and renewable fuel.

A bill currently going through the Hawai‘i State Legislature will require that large parking facilities have charging stations for electric vehicles.

People are even developing heavy transportation electric vehicles.

Why is Hamakua Springs Country Farms interested in electric cars?

It’s because we are building a hydroelectric plant, where we will generate electricity from water that runs through a flume on our property. We will sell the excess electricity back to the public utility.

We wonder how farmers everywhere in Hawai‘i can participate in renewable energy production.

Oil is a finite resource and world population is increasing at the rate of 70 million annually. We all know that oil prices will rise to unbearable heights in the future.

We also know that our food security depends on Hawai‘i’s farmers farming, and making enough money that they stay in farming. How can we position our farmers so they make money on renewable energy they generate on their farm, in addition to the money they make farming? Because we know that if the farmers make money, the farmers will farm.

Renewable energy production is capital-intensive, not labor-intensive. There is no weeding, spraying, plowing or harvesting. Once a renewable energy project is installed, the farmer can go back to farming.

In conjunction with this need for food security, I suggested to the Farm Bureau that we initiate a bill that would authorize preferential rates of return for bonafide farmers who produce renewable energy. HB 591 HD1 SD2 is likely to be passed by the Legislature this session.

If the farmers make money, the farmers will farm. And then we will have food security.

Adopt-a-Class, Government, Mauna Kea

Adopt-A-Class, Year Three

Last night I sent in testimony supporting the Senate Bill that would give authority to the University of Hawai‘i at Hilo’s Mauna Kea Rangers to implement the Comprehensive Management Plan. (See below.)

The Senate passed the bill today, which was good.

But I kept on thinking about our Adopt-A-Class project, and wanting to make sure the Keaukaha Elementary School children can continue to go on excursions. Six hundred dollars adopts a class at Keauakaha Elementary School and sends the students on an excursion they would otherwise not take.

This is the third year we are seeking donations for our Adopt-A-Class program. At our website, you’ll see that a person or group can sponsor the whole excursion for one class ($600), or make a donation of $100 or more and contribute toward that class excursion.

If you can help, please look at the website and tell us which class you’d like to sponsor, and for what amount. There is more information about the process here.

In the meantime, here is the testimony I sent in. Among other things, it explains how we came to start the Adopt-A-Class program in the first place.

Dear Senators,



I am testifying in very strong support of HB 1174, HD3, SD2, the bill that enables us to malama Mauna Kea. Mauna Kea is our kuleana. We know what to do.

I am Richard Ha and I’m a native Hawaiian and a life-long Big Island farmer. We farm 600 acres at Pepeekeo. We have farmed bananas for 25 years and hydroponic vegetables for the last five. Over the years we have produced millions of pounds of food. We sell under the Hamakua Springs brand in the supermarkets. Nearly 70 of us work on the farm. We are concerned with food security and sustainability, especially since we sit out here on islands in the middle of the Pacific.

I would like to share with you how I came to be involved with issues related to Mauna Kea. Three years ago, when I was a new member of the Hawai‘i Island Economic Development Board, the Thirty-Meter Telescope people inquired about siting their telescope on Mauna Kea and the HIEDB formed a special TMT committee. I had strong feelings about the way it should be done: It should be done right! So I volunteered to sit on that committee. Before that, I was just a banana farmer.

When you talk about Mauna Kea you automatically talk about the Hawaiian culture, and when you talk about that, you end up in Keaukaha, the oldest Hawaiian Homes community on the Big Island (75 years). I found that the elementary school there is the center of the Keaukaha community.

I went to see Kumu Lehua Veincent, principal of Keaukaha Elementary School, with what I thought was a good proposal: “The TMT wants to come to the Big Island; what happens if we can convince them to give some kids from the community five, full-ride scholarships to the best schools in the nation?”

Kumu Lehua listened, and then he asked me: “What about the rest?” I could feel my ears getting hot and I felt kind of stupid. Yes, what about the rest?

Also, because the TMT had intentions to do things for the community, I expected the community would be receptive. Instead, I found that the Keaukaha people were very wary, wanting to know: “What do you really want?” They had been promised things many times before.

In the meantime, the TMT board decided to deal directly with UH system. But having met and liked the people in the Keaukaha community and elementary school, I went back again and again to talk story.

One day, I offered to sponsor an excursion to my farm. In the course of that trip, I asked Kumu: “Eh, where you guys go on excursion?” He told me they did not go. “No more money.” Instead, they walked around the neighborhood. I said: “What you mean?” He said, “The bus costs $300 and we don’t have enough money for all the classes.”

I was shocked. How could this be? There were hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of telescopes on Mauna Kea and there was no evidence of any benefit to Keaukaha, the most Hawaiian of Hawaiian communities?  This no can! We needed to do something.

So, myself, Duane Kanuha, Leslie Lang and Macario decided to copy the Adopt a Child template—where you pay $20 a month and the child sends you a letter and a picture every so often. We decided to do an Adopt A Class project so each class could go on excursions.

We figured $300 for the bus and $300 for entry fees to ‘Imiloa – the world-class Hawaiian culture astronomy museum. So for $600, people could adopt one class and send them on excursion. In four months, we had all the classes going on excursions both semesters.



The idea was contagious. Gordon and Betty Moore heard about the project and donated money to send all classes on the Big Island, from kindergarden to high school – in all public, private and charter schools – to ‘Imiloa. That was nearly three years ago. Now I hear they plan to expand this idea to the San Francisco Bay area.

And due to Kumu Lehua’s leadership, Keaukaha Elementary, a perpetually low-achieving school, had two consecutive years of improvements and came off the No Child Left Behind non-performing list. It was the only elementary school on the Big Island to achieve this distinction. Now they are role models. Imagine that.

Kumu Lehua told me this story: He said a teacher recently came in to interview to see if she could teach at Keaukaha Elementary. He rolled his chair back and told me, “She said it was a career move!”

I have attended at least eight public hearings about Mauna Kea, and many regular meetings of the Keaukaha Community Association, as well as meetings of the Kanaka Council. I have friends on all sides of the issue.

I see myself as a bridge between the shiny shoe crowd and the rubbah slippah crowd. I think that if we all can move toward the center a bit, we can make this work for all of us and especially for future generations.

It is no secret that I think that the TMT can bring benefit to the community. But when I first volunteered for the TMT committee, I insisted it be done right.

So we must malama Mauna Kea before we do anything else. HB 1174, HD3, SD2 helps to enforce the rules that the Comprehensive Management Plan proposes.

I started off by saying that we should not let the perfect be the enemy of the good. When I was a young boy, my dad told me: “There are a thousand reasons why, no can; I only looking for one reason why: CAN!”

Richard Ha, President, Hamakua Springs Country Farms

Government, Sustainability

Hawai‘i County Environmental Management Commission

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I was copied in on this email yesterday, after having been confirmed by the County Council to a seat on its Environmental Management Commission, pending full Council confirmation in two weeks.

Sharron Henry
County of Hawai`i,Department of Environmental Management

Mr. Ha’s nomination for District 4 Commission member replacing Arnold was unanimously approved at the Env. Mgmt. Council Committee today. He was also advised that he did not need to appear for full council approval which should be in 2 weeks.

Hopefully Mr. Ha will be attending our next meeting in Hilo on May 27th where we can all welcome him.

I was asked to serve on this Commission several months ago and my reply was, “Anyway that I can help Mayor Kenoi, I want to do it.”

The confirmation process was very friendly. I know most of the Council folks and we all have the same basic goals for our people. We all live on the Big Island out here in the middle of the Pacific and want to do the best for our kids and future generations.

I’m very much looking forward to this work.

Food Security, Government, Renewable Energy Sources, Sustainability

Trouble on Hawai‘i’s Farms

Hawai‘i’s farmers are in trouble. There was an informational meeting of the House Agriculture, Water, Land and Ocean Committees Friday, and several of us testified. A post about it on the House of Representatives blog is titled The Rodney Dangerfield of the Economy and refers to how agriculture “doesn’t get any respect.”

IMG_0155_1House Committees on Agriculture, Land, Water and Ocean. The Farm Bureau requested this informational hearing prior to the regular session.

This informational meeting came about after I gave a short speech at the Farm Bureau convention in October. Everybody’s business was in trouble but nobody wanted to talk. It’s local style to keep quiet, be reticent and not complain. I told the farmers in attendance that I knew they were having a hard time and that they should not have to suffer in silence.

I said, “You shouldn’t feel like you have to make an excuse. In fact, you shouldn’t have to shoulder the whole burden yourself.”

Shortly after that, Mae Nakahata, Vice President of the Farm Bureau, called me and said that some of the farmers she knew were in serious financial trouble. She then started the ball rolling to do something to help farmers. She was the driving force behind Friday’s informational meeting of the legislators.

IMG_0156_1It was standing room only, with three TV cameras and several print journalists present. Clifton Tsuji, chair of the Ag Committee, told me it was very unuusal to see this many people at an informational briefing.

Although we are considered large farmers, I do not think it’s prudent to depend on a few large farms. I am also very concerned about the idea that any of Hawai‘i farmers may be hiring illegal foreign workers. This video clip shows two O‘ahu farm managers being led away in handcuffs.

This is very disappointing because while this was going on, a lot of us were down at the Capitol testifying that farmers were in trouble. In an earlier informal survey, the farm in those news articles was understood to be one of only a few farms that was doing well. But if the stories are true and that farm was doing well because of illegal activity, this is not healthy for our state agricultural industry.

I don’t think we should be relying on foreign labor in this day and age, with what’s happening to our economy (which we know will get worse before it gets better). It’s not sustainable, and more importantly we should have local people working on our farms. We can accomplish this by diversifying geographically – so that our farms are where the people, and the resources, are.

I testified Friday that it’s not rocket science. The world has changed forever, but “if farmers make money, farmers will farm.”  Farmers got in trouble earlier this year when oil prices spiked, which was only a sneak preview of what’s yet to come.

And if we have not prepared before it happens again, as we know it will, it could be disastrous for agriculture and for Hawai‘i’s food security.

We have an opportunity in the recent energy agreement between the state, HEI and the Consumer Advocate.

The legislature should add an extra incentive to farmers when the feed-in-tariff is in place by July. Besides helping farmers make money, using cutting edge technology may get the attention of younger people. No one wants to get into a business just to watch plants grow. We need action to interest the next generation. Alternate energy projects and their possibilities could provide an extra spark, especially if combined with the chance of making money.

This idea has the possibility of diversifying our food production – to farmers large and small, on all islands, at all elevations and both of the dry side and wet side of the islands. (I always say this when talking about the future of Hawai‘i’s agriculture.)

We need small farms expanding. We do not need large farms just getting bigger and bigger and gobbling up smaller farms.

Chef Alan Wong testified, too, as a restaurateur who uses local farm products in part so visitors can “taste Hawai‘i.”

Last year, a legislator tried to convince me that the card check bill – a bill that made it easier for workers to form unions – was necessary because there were abuses that I did not know of. I was not convinced.

I have changed my mind about the labor union card check bill. I feel that farms that treat their workers well should have no problems.

Current Affairs, Government, Renewable Energy Sources

It’s Official: the Renewable Energy Farm Loan Bill

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June and I were invited to the Governor’s office yesterday to witness the signing of Bill 2261, a renewable energy Farm Loan Bill which I helped shepherd through the legislature.

In her remarks, Governor Lingle pointed out that the goal for Hawaii is to be 70% fossil fuel free by 2030. She also mentioned working with contacts in Israel to see if there is a way we can take advantage of Israel’s effort to be 100% converted to electric vehicles in three years. These are two huge initiatives. I am glad we are doing this.

There were several bills being signed, and four of us were invited to speak.  David Murdock, President of Dole Corporation, complained that the bill to streamline the process for his 400 MW project on Lana‘i, although helpful, does not go far enough.

He wants the Governor to declare an emergency. He believes that the airlines are on the verge of bankruptcy, that very few people will be flying in the near future and that Hawai‘i’s future will be bleak if we don’t do something now.

I happen to believe he is right. Office of Hawaiian Affairs administrator Clyde Namau‘u writes in the July edition of the OHA newspaper Ka Wai Ola that we are bracing for a rough ride and that “grants to community organizations could also shrink.” The most defenseless among us will be the first to feel the effects of the wrenching downturn in the economy.

There is a heartbreaking letter to the editor in today’s Hawai‘i Tribune-Herald titled “What Is Happening?” Abigail Fojas writes: “I know a few single moms who were laid off, asking me if I know anyone who will hire them because they can’t make the rent next month, and unemployment won’t keep them in their homes. These women have like three kids and no husband. These are driven people who have worked most of their lives.”

But though I believe  Mr. Murdock is right, I just don’t see that people are ready to act, especially since the TV stations and the news media don’t even think the passage of these bills was newsworthy.

I was so busy thinking about my own speech that I did not hear the other two speakers. At the last minute I was mentally changing my speech around. I wanted to describe how this bill came to be, how Dwight Takamine’s dad Yoshito introduced it at the Farm Bureau convention and to talk a little bit about what Hamakua Springs is going to do. Next thing I knew I was up. This is what I said:

Thanks to the Legislature, Senate Ag Committee Chairperson Jill Tokuda and House Ag Committee Chairperson Clift Tsuji, who introduced the bill into their respective chambers and the Ag Committees of both Houses. Special thanks to Sandy Kunimoto, the Director of the Hawaii State Department of Agriculture, and especially the personnel in the Farm Loan Department, Dean Matsukawa and Mark Yamaki in particular. They were the ones who put the bill together.

This bill went through the entire process without one dissenting vote. I guess everyone likes to eat.

I was the only person from Hawai‘i who attended the Peak Oil conference in Houston this past October. It was clear that world oil supply was not able to keep up with demand. And it was clear that fuel prices were going to be rising with no end in sight.

Rising energy costs affect farmers very quickly. You can call farming the canary in the coal mine. Fertilizer, chemicals, irrigation, packing, cooling and transportation costs are all petroleum related.

Returning home, it was apparent that since we import most of our food, we need to do something to help farmers grow more food. The question was: “How will we feed Hawai‘i’s people?”

The answer is not complicated. “If the farmer makes money, the farmer will farm.”

This renewable energy farm bill is a Farm Loan Program that will allow Hawai‘i’s farmers to make low-cost loans for projects such as hydroelectric, solar, wind and bio fuels. This will help farmers big and small, on all islands, at all elevations, wet side-dry side, conventional/organic, high elevation and low. All farmers will benefit.

As an example of how this bill can benefit farmers, take our case. Hamakua Springs farms 600 acres of diversified crops, including bananas, and hydroponic vegetables such as tomatoes, Japanese cucumbers, green onions, lettuces as well as others. We are planning to do aquaculture soon. There are 80-something workers, together with three generations of us, who operate Hamakua Springs Country Farms.

Hamakua Springs is located in Pepe‘ekeo, 10 miles north of Hilo. As everyone knows, Hilo rains. One hundred forty inches of rain fall in an average year. We have three streams running through the property, as well as a flume that used to feed the sugar mill.

The renewable energy Farm Loan Bill will allow us to finance the borrowing of water from the flume in an 18-inch pipe, which we run downhill to a turbine that spins and makes electricity. We will then return the water that we are borrowing back to the flume.

Our monthly electric bill has gone from $9,000 a short time ago to $15,000 now. And there is no end in sight. But with this alternate energy farm bill, our monthly payments to make the hydroelectric plant will be less than half of the present electric bill.

After we install the hydroelectric project, we will have excess electricity. We are thinking of allowing our workers to plug their hybrid electric cars as an extra benefit for working for the farm. We are also thinking of using the banana waste to feed fish. We plan to take the ammonia from the fish waste, run it through a biofilter and send the usable fertilizer downstream to hydroponic vegetables. Then, we’ll pump the water back to the top with the excess electricity from our hydroelectric plant.

By temperature control we can fool plants into thinking its summer when it is winter. Chilling the plants in the summer will fool the plants into producing in the winter, when supplies are short. Small berries come to mind.

This is just one example. We could have hundreds of farmers taking advantage of this Farm Loan Program and implementing clever ideas we had no idea can be done.

Farmers are very resourceful and innovative people. This bill will help farmers grow more food. As we said before, “If the farmer can make money, the farmers will farm.

Help Hawai‘i’s farmers and feed Hawaii’s people. Buy local. We can do this!

I think it went over well. The governor said she liked that we’re proactive and many others told me that they liked the remarks as well.

Government, Peak Oil, Renewable Energy Sources

Where We’re At

An editorial in yesterday’s Hawaii Tribune-Herald reads:

Bill is Bad for Business, Bad for All Hawaii:

House Bill 2974, informally known as the “card check” bill, would have permitted labor unions to automatically be recognized whenever a majority of workers at a small business sign authorization cards. The bill also would mandate timelines for collective bargaining and impose binding arbitration in labor negotiations.

No secret ballot would be required, and there would be no independent supervision of the card check process.

Existing law requires a secret ballot election if 30 percent of the workers sign cards. The election, which is monitored by the government, determines whether the union is recognized.

When I first heard about this I was shocked to see that this bill targeted agriculture. Why in the world would our legislators want to target small papaya farmers and foliage growers? I am curious to see if the legislators choose to override the governor’s veto.

I’ve been writing in this blog that in the face of coming economic hardships, we need to make more friends and become closer to our families and community. We will need to help each other. This bill is disappointing because it will cause divisiveness, rather than togetherness.

It was another week of steadily rising oil prices, with crude moving from a low of $109 a barrel on Monday to a new high, over $117 a barrel, by Friday. By now the reasons for the continued climb are familiar – stagnant production, shrinking exports, increasing demand, a falling dollar, the flight to safety in commodities, declining U.S. stockpiles, and, of all things, the perception of an improving U.S. economy.

This week, several new factors contributed to the increase. Reports that Russian oil production slipped during the first quarter for the first time in a decade, coupled with assertions by senior Russian oilmen that Moscow’s production is not going higher, were troublesome.

Here is a link to a weekly report on the world oil situation. It is significant because it says that Saudi Arabia will be limiting its production of oil in order to save oil for future generations, which has serious long-term implications for oil importers. During the week the Saudis said they had trimmed output from 9.2 million barrels/day to 9 million.

We must be aware that their own middle class is growing and will want to use more of that oil internally, within their own country. So less and less will be available for export!

We need to move more decisively toward alternate energy. Geothermal comes to mind. HELCO needs to figure out how CAN. Not, “No can!”

Food Security, Government, Renewable Energy Sources

Selling Electricity

I’m starting to become a policy wonk, which was not in my plan!

Monday I testified at the legislature on behalf of resolution HR 254/HCR 504, which urges the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) to rule that all Schedule Q contracts should receive the full “avoided cost” pricing.

It was important to me to testify about this because the PUC is changing its interpretation of how to pay for electricity that is sold to the electric company under “Schedule Q.”

Schedule Q applies to small power producers that generate less than 100 KW. One hundred kilowatts is enough power to continuously run approximately 15 refrigerated containers, each 40 feet long.

Schedule Q always paid “avoided costs” of oil—in other words, the oil costs that would have been used to generate the electricity.  For instance, if HELCO charges 32 cents per kilowatt hour (KWH) for electricity, and 23 cents of that cost was for oil costs, then HELCO would pay small power producers 23 cents per KWH for any electricity they bought.

Now the PUC says that the rate the utility pays should not be tied to “avoided costs” of oil. We worry that this will mean lower returns. If that’s the case, people will not want to undertake alternate energy projects.

Because the “avoided costs” in my example of 23 cents/KWH is much less that the 32 cents/KWH that HELCO charges customers, Schedule Q actually encourages innovation as people seek ways to maximize the use of the electricity generated. I know we ask ourselves everyday: “How else can we use the excess electricity from our hydroelectric project?”

I feel it’s important that Schedule Q continue to be interpreted as-is, because then we are keeping the money for electricity in our own economy. It does not end up making electricity cost more. And why pay foreigners for oil, when you can keep the money here with our own people? And if farmers happen to take advantage of this rate, maybe more people will farm, and then we will have the added benefit of becoming more food secure here in Hawai‘i.”

Electric Bills Stun

Just a couple days ago, the Hawai‘i Tribune-Herald’s front page headline read: “Electric bills stun isle residents; Fuel surcharge adds $76 to typical home’s cost.”

Electricity rates are rising, and food costs and everything else related to oil is also getting more expensive. A couple weeks ago I spoke about food and fuel to the Hilo Bay Rotary Club, and one person there told me that he owns a service station snack shop operation. His electric costs, projected to be $70,000 just a few months ago, are now projected to cost $100,000 annually. He told me that his profit margins are shrinking because he can only raise his sandwich prices so much.

If there is an opportunity for him, and others, to sell electricity under Schedule Q, it will benefit all of us. If not, we will just keep importing more foreign oil to generate the electricity he could have produced.

Recently I looked at a modeling exercise done by Dr. Makena Coffman at the University of Hawai‘i Economic Research Organization. It was titled “Oil Price Shocks and Hawai‘i’s Economy.”

I told her of the Alternate Energy Ag Farm Loan Bill that we are pushing through the legislature. She said she was glad to hear there are “renewable energy for agriculture” bills going forward, because, she said:

“Initiatives like that are exactly what we need to mitigate a drawn-out recession. Oil price shocks historically have short-term effects that dissipate over time, largely because it induces some innovation and behavioral change. Getting local Ag through all this really depends on its ability to decouple the sector from oil as an input.”

Schedule Q plays a crucial part in enabling behavioral change.

Biofuels

More and more I hear that biofuels will play a big part in our energy future. First we need to realize that biofuel production is farming.

Here is a quick and dirty estimation of what a farmer can earn farming biofuel:

Say a barrel of oil costs $100 and each barrel contains 42 gallons; that means each gallon of oil is worth $2.38. Each gallon weighs approximately 8 lbs., so each pound of liquid oil costs 30 cents. If it takes three pounds of palm nuts, jatropha, kukui nuts, macadamia nuts or whatever to make one 1 lb. of oil, then the most the farmers could expect as a return is 10 cents per pound.

No farmer would farm biofuels, or anything else, for 10 cents/lb., or even 20 cents/lb. And the Big Island’s terrain and weather do not lend themselves to big agriculture.

I really don’t think biofuel could even take care of transportation, let alone generate electricity. So we really need to think about relying more on electricity for most of our energy needs.

Here is an analysis that says that when oil hits $162 per barrel we will go into a recession much like the recession of the 70s. http://www.financialsense.com/Market/cpuplava/2007/1003.html.

The exact price that will trigger this to happen is not important. What is important is that when we go into recession because of high oil prices, it will be very difficult to come out again – because demand will be outstripping supply by larger and larger amounts. And oil prices will continuously rise. How we fare will largely depend on how successful we have been in decoupling ourselves from foreign oil.

Schedule Q is one way to incentivize people to decouple from foreign oil.

As I have said before: “The kahuna not going save us.”