Category Archives: Lowering Electric Rates

Big Island, Eating Locally, Food Security, Geothermal, Government, Lowering Electric Rates, Peak Oil, Renewable Energy Sources, Science, Sustainability

Let’s Adapt To Change, And Survive/Thrive

November 5, 2013 Richard Ha

Richard Ha writes:

What we’re doing on the Big Island with Bill 113 is trying to make a law that prohibits us from helping ourselves. It is the exact opposite of what we should be doing.

The biggest problem we face today is at the intersection of energy and agriculture. In a nutshell: As petroleum prices rise, there’s a direct consequence on agriculture and everything that goes into it (fertilizer, chemicals, packing materials, etc.).

We rely on oil here far more than does the U.S. mainland. We generate 78 percent of our electricity from oil, whereas on the mainland, it’s only two percent. As oil prices rise, everything that has electric costs associated with it gets more expensive. We already see this happening.

Our farmers and food producers on this agricultural-based island are becoming less competitive, and our food prices are skyrocketing.

We need to find a way to be more competitive, which will not only keep our farmers and food producers working, and make us more “food secure,” but will also make our food costs go down instead of continuing to increase.

It’s energy and technology that determine agricultural costs, and fortunately we have two ways to solve this big problem:

Energy

We are extremely fortunate here on the Big Island to have a resource that most places don’t have: We have the gift of geothermal energy. Geothermal costs only half as much as oil, and the resource will be stable (we will be over the “hot spot” that makes it possible) for 500,000 years.

If we increase our use of geothermal over the years as the price of oil rises, we will be more competitive with the rest of the world. This will be good for our island’s ag industry and also for our people, who will see prices go down, instead of up.

Agriculture

Biotech solutions generally lower costs. They can help increase production, whether it’s with university-developed solutions that help plants resist diseases and pests, or biotech solutions that allow plants to manufacture their own nitrogen so we don’t have to import fertilizer (which requires electricity to produce and oil to get to Hawai‘i).

Then we will be able to rely on natural sunlight for our primary energy, which gives us a tremendous, and not common, advantage – we can grow crops here all year around. Insects, pests and weeds grow all year around too, though, and biotech can safely help us with those problems so we will become even more sustainable and competitive.

Using geothermal plus appropriate biotech solutions can give us a huge advantage over the rest of the world, and make life better for us here at home, but we don’t have much time. We have to let science and technology prevail so we can move forward, not stagnate nor fall behind, and we have to get on this now.

There is some unwarranted fear about using biotechnology, but know that all the major scientific organizations in the world say foods created with biotechnology are as safe as those created otherwise.

Oil is a finite resource, and its cost will rise. There is no question about this. It’s a predictable consequence of what’s happening now, and this is not just my take on it.

Gail Tverberg, who is an actuary and an expert on Peak Oil, says it’s not the physical oil that’s a problem, but it’s whether or not we can afford it – because, of course, the harder it is to find the oil, the more expensive it becomes. This is what’s happening right now. She predicts that in two years we’ll be in really serious trouble.

Citibank recently put out a report predicting that Saudi Arabia will no longer export oil by year 2030 – only 17 years from now – because they will be using all their oil within their own country. The consequence of this would be rising oil prices, and the effects would be felt much sooner than 2030.

Many, many other reports agree that the price of oil will continue to rise. The whole prospect is pretty scary.

Michael Kumhof of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) says the IMF can’t even model what will happen if oil hits $200/barrel, because that would be entirely uncharted territory.

I have been to five Peak Oil conferences now, which I started attending in order to figure out how to position our farm for the future. In the course of learning about the oil situation, I realized I was the only person from Hawai‘i attending, and realized I needed to share what I was learning here at home.

What I learned is that the world has been using two to three times as much oil as we’ve been finding, and that this trend continues. Over the five years I attended the conferences, we started to hear predictions of when unparalleled high oil prices, the kind the IMF cannot even model, could occur.

It might be two years from now, or it might be 20 years, but it will happen, and it might happen soon. We need to start preparing now.

Charles Darwin said it’s not the strongest nor the smartest who survive, but the ones that can adapt to change. Let’s survive, and more.

Aquaponics, Bananas, Big Island, Blog, Family of Farms, How It All Started, Hydroelectric, Lowering Electric Rates, Mauna Kea, Our Story, Peak Oil, Sustainability, Video, Where We Live

Huffington & Omidyar Visit Hamakua Springs

September 7, 2013 Richard Ha 1 Comment

By Leslie Lang, blog editor

Thursday was such an interesting day. Arianna Huffington of the Huffington Post, and Pierre Omidyar, founder of Honolulu’s online newspaper Civil Beat (and founder of eBay), spent some time at Hamakua Springs Country Farms.

The background is that Huffington Post and Civil Beat have teamed up to start HuffPost Hawaii (and they asked Richard to blog for the new online news organization. Here’s his first HuffPost Hawaii post, by the way.)

So this week, Arianna and Pierre were making the rounds in Hawai‘i for the big HuffPost Hawaii launch. They spent Thursday on the Big Island, where they were welcomed with a big reception at ‘Imiloa Astronomy Center.

The only other Big Island stop they made was to Richard’s farm. They had asked if they could come and meet Richard and learn about what he’s doing. So that happened Thursday afternoon, and Richard invited me to join them there.

What a completely fascinating day. There’s something about being around really smart people who are doing big and really interesting things, making things happen and making a difference. Richard is completely like that, too, as you know if you’ve been reading this blog. It’s invigorating to be around that kind of energy.

Both Arianna and Pierre are very friendly and down-to-earth, and both are interested in issues of sustainability and what Richard is doing.

Richard told them about his background — flunking out of college the first time around and ending up in Vietnam, coming back and trading manure from his father’s chicken farm for bananas to start what eventually became Hamakua Springs Country Farms — about seeing prices start rising, rising, rising and wondering why; about attending five Peak Oil conferences and starting to learn what was happening. He talked about how he forces the changes needed to get to where he needs to be five or 10 years in the future.

He talked about the current threat to Big Island farming from anti-GMO bills, and Pierre asked some very salient (and polite) questions about some common GMO fears, such as of:

Commercial control of seeds. Richard replied that in many cases, such as with, for instance, the Rainbow papaya, virus-resistant seeds are developed by the university and not controlled by any big business at all. This, he said, is often the case.

Cross-pollination, or “pollen drift.” Richard responded that due to numerous studies, we know how much drift there is for different crops. Farmers work together, he says, to plan what is planted where, plant so many lines of “guard rows” and it’s completely manageable.

They asked about Richard’s new hydroelectric system, and we took a dusty, bumpy country road drive out to see where the water runs through an old sugar cane flume, and then through a turbine.

Arianna and Pierre were very interested in this, and in how, when the switch is thrown very shortly, the farm will be saving perhaps almost half of its monthly electric bill, which now averages $10-11,000.

Pierre asked about returning excess power to the utility, and was shocked to learn that due to a technicality, Richard will not be paid for the power he feeds to HELCO. Pierre kept returning to that and said, more than once, “That’s just not right.” Richard finally replied, “Well, at least it’s not wasted.”

Richard Ha, Arianna Huffington, Pierre Omidyar, Leslie Lang, June Ha

Richard talked about how they have converted the farm from growing mostly bananas to being a family of farms, which brings in local farmers who then have a close-to-home place to farm. This, in turn, means the farm produces a more diverse crop.

He told Arianna and Pierre about growing their current experiment growing tilapia, to learn how to add a protein component to the food they produce and also use the waste as fertilizer. Workers can fish for tilapia there and take some home for their families.

Arianna and Pierre both seemed sincerely interested. They paid close attention and asked good questions.

Richard told them about talking with Kumu Lehua Veincent, who was principal of Keaukaha Elementary School back in the early days of the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) push. He told them that he asked Kumu Lehua, “What if we ask the TMT for five, full-ride scholarships to the best schools in the nation for your best students?” He told them that Kumu Lehua thought about it for a minute and then quietly asked, “And what about the rest?”

This was a turning point, explained Richard, who said that at the time he could feel his ears turning red. He told Arianna and Pierre that that phrase, What about the rest? gives him an “unfailing moral compass.”

It always brings him back to the rubbah slippah folk, he told them. The “rubbah slippah” folk are in contrast to the “shiny shoes” folk. When he explained this, Pierre looked down at his own shoes.

“I wore my shiny shoes today,” he said, “but I meant to change into my sneakers before coming to the farm.” He mentioned his shiny shoes a couple more times during the visit.

“I felt they absolutely got what I meant when I advocated for the ‘rubbah slippah’ folks,” Richard told me, “and completely support that idea.”

Richard’s daughter Tracy had laid out a beautiful spread of Hamakua Springs produce back by the office, where there was a tent set up, and Arianna zeroed in on the longan.

“What’s this?” she said, and Tracy explained that it’s a delicious fruit. She handed one to Arianna, along with some wipes (they are juicy and messy), and Arianna loved it.

Arianna gives the impression of being very family-oriented. “At what point did you and June get married in this long process?” she asked, when Richard was explaining how he got started farming 35 years ago. (The answer: 32 years ago, and when June joined the family she took all the farm receipts out of a big banana box and straightened out the accounting.) Arianna asked Tracy if she had siblings. When she was introduced to Richard’s grandson Kapono, she looked at him, and at his parents, and asked, “Now, are you Tracy and Kimo’s son?” (Yes.)

She gave June a copy of her book, On Becoming Fearless.

Both Arianna and Pierre are such interesting people. One of the things Richard talks about is forcing change, and that is something that both his guests are all about, too: Looking down the road and fixing things, forcing the change instead of letting things bumble along.

It is refreshing to be in the presence of such interesting thinkers and doers. Great day.

This is a video Civil Beat did with Richard recently, before Arianna and Pierre’s visit. It’s really nicely done and you get to hear a bit about some of the topics they discussed yesterday (while seeing gorgeous views of the farm).

Aquaponics, Family of Farms, Food Security, Hydroelectric, Lowering Electric Rates, Peak Oil, Renewable Energy Sources, Sustainability, Water

State of the Farm Report

August 15, 2013 Richard Ha 1 Comment

Richard Ha writes:

Yesterday at the farm I had a meeting with all our workers. It was an update on where we have been and where we are going.

Where we’ve been

The price of oil has quadrupled in the last 10 years, and those who could pass on the cost did. Those who could not pass on the cost ended up paying more. Farmers are price takers, not price makers, so farmers’ costs increased more than their prices.

Anticipating higher electricity prices, we lobbied for and passed a law that the Department of Agriculture create a new farm loan program that farmers could use for renewable energy purposes. Then we started to design a hydroelectricity program to stabilize our electricity costs.

Where we are today

The hydroelectricity project is within weeks of completion. With the combination of a farm loan and a grant from the Department of Energy, we will stabilize our electricity price at 40 percent less than we pay today.

The pipe that transports the water appears to me like it will last for more than 100 years. After the loan is paid off, our electricity will be practically free for more than 60 years.

Where we are going

We are taking advantage of our resources – free water and stable electricity costs – by working with area farmers to help each other grow more food.

What kind of food? Responding to consumer demand, we want to
produce food with a wide variety of nutritional content, including protein, via aquaculture.

In order to be sustainable, the feed-based protein must be vegetation-based. And since the building block of protein is nitrogen, we are looking for an adequate nitrogen source. Unused, wasted electricity can be used to make ammonia, which is a nitrogen fertilizer and, like a battery, can be used to store energy.

What does the future
look like?

Other than stable electricity, which would help us, our serious
concern is the anti-GMO Bill 79. It seeks to ban any new biotech solutions to farmers’ problems on the Big Island. The result is that the rest of the counties and the nation would be able to use new tools for more successful farming, and the Big Island would not.

What would happen is that Big Island farmers would become
less competitive, which would put even more pressure on those already at the bottom of the pay scale. It would result in higher food costs, making consumers less able to support local farmers.

The folks pushing for the anti-GMO bill have not talked to farmers, and they have no clue that this bill would make Hawai‘i less food
secure. The bottom line is that food security involves farmers farming. If the farmers make money, the farmers will farm. If not, they will quit.

Food Security, Geothermal, Lowering Electric Rates

One Cost of Paradise: Food Insecurity

July 11, 2013 Richard Ha 1 Comment

Richard Ha writes:

The high cost of Paradise is making us less and less food secure.

From the Economic Research Organization at the University of Hawaii:

An Insight on the Cost of Paradise

Posted July 3, 2013 |

Whether visitors or residents in Hawai‘i, we are all aware of the high cost of living in paradise. One major contributing factor is the cost of energy. Households in Hawai‘i pay 4 times more than the average US household and nearly 7 times the households in Utah, where the residential energy cost is the cheapest in the nation.* While the US average for April 2013 hovered at 12 cents/kwh, Hawai‘i paid 37 cents/kwh for electricity in the residential sector.** … Read the rest here

Hawai‘i uses oil for more than 70 percent of its electricity, while the U.S. mainland uses oil for only 2 percent of its electricity. Any
food product from the mainland that uses lots of electricity in its processing has an increasing advantage over Hawai‘i food producers and manufacturers.

The U.S. mainland is both our supplier and our competitor. The mainland’s use of cheap natural gas versus our usage of expensive feedstock for electricity production makes all the difference. It’s all about cost. There is no free lunch. Subsidies are not free.

Agriculture and energy are inextricably tied together. Energy helps us do work. Since no one in the world has found a solution for liquid transportation fuel, we need to look to electricity.

On the Big Island, we do have a solution. Geothermal is the cheapest way to generate electricity. And with the throwaway electricity at night, we can generate ammonia, which is a nitrogen fertilizer as well as a hydrogen source. And when we generate cheap electricity, we can run electric vehicles as an alternative to using liquid fuel.

Stable cost for fertilizer for farmers, low-cost electricity for the rubbah slippah folks, clean transportation and a low walk around cost for tourists. We can have the best of all worlds.

Not no can! CAN!

Aquaponics, Bananas, Big Island, Eating Locally, Family of Farms, Food Security, Geothermal, Hamakua Coast, How It All Started, Hydroelectric, Hydroponics, Lowering Electric Rates, Our Employees, Renewable Energy Sources, Sustainability, Taro/Poi, Tomatoes, Water, Where We Live

The Wheres & Whyfors of Hamakua Springs

June 9, 2013 Leslie Lang

By Leslie Lang

The other day Richard gave some of us a tour of Hamakua Springs Country Farms in Pepe‘ekeo, and its new hydroelectric plant, and wow. I hadn’t been out to the farm for awhile, and it was so interesting to ride around the 600 acres with Richard and see all that’s going on there these days.

Most of what I realized (again) that afternoon fell into two
broad categories: That Richard really is a master of seeing the big picture, and that everything he does is related to that big picture.

Hamakua Springs, which started out growing bananas and then expanded into growing the deliciously sweet hydroponic tomatoes we all know the farm for, has other crops as well.

These days there are farmers leasing small plots where they are growing taro, corn, ginger and sweet potato. These farmers’ products go to the Hamakua Springs packing house and Hamakua Springs distributes them, which speaks to Richard’s goal of providing a place for local farmers to farm, wherethere is water and packing and distribution already in place.

As we drove, we saw a lot of the water that passes through his farm. There are three streams and three springs. It’s an enormous amount of water, and it’s because of all this water that he was able to develop his brand new hydroelectric system, where they are getting ready to throw the switch.

The water wasn’t running through there the day we were there because they’d had to temporarily “turn it off” – divert the water – in order to fix something, but we could see how the water from an old plantation flume now runs through the headworks and through a pipe and into the turbine, which is housed in a blue shipping container.

This is where the electricity is generated, and I was interested to see a lone electric pole standing there next to the system. End of the line! Or start of the line, really, as that’s where the electricity from the turbine is carried to. And from there, it works its way across the electric lines stretched between new poles reaching across the land.

He asked the children who were along with us for their ideas
about how to landscape around the hydroelectric area, and also where the water leaves the turbine to run out and rejoin the stream.

“We could do anything here,” he said, asking for thoughts, and
we all came up with numerous ideas, some fanciful. Trees and grass? A taro lo‘i? Maybe a picnic area, or a water flume ride or a demonstration garden or fishponds?

There are interesting plans for once the hydro system is operating, including a certified kitchen where local area producers can bring their products and create value-added goods.

Other plans include having some sort of demo of sustainable
farming, and perhaps ag-tourism ativities like walking trails going through the farm, and maybe even a B&B. “The basis of all tourism,” he said, “is sustainability.”

Hamakua Springs is also experimenting with growing mushrooms
now, and looking into several other possibilities for using its free
electricity.

As we stopped and looked at the streams we kept coming
across, which ran under the old plantation roads we drove upon, Richard made an observation that I found interesting. In the Hawaiian way, the land is thought of as following the streams down from mountain to sea. In traditional ways, paths generally ran up-and-down the hill, following the shape of the ahupua‘a.

“But look at the plantation roads,” he said, and he pointed
out how they run across the land, from stream to stream. The plantation way was the opposite. Not “wrong” – just different.

Richard has plans to plant bamboo on the south sides of the
streams, which will keep the water cool and keep out invasive species.

At the farm, they continue to experiment with raising
tilapia, which are in four blue pools next to the reservoir.

June with a full net

The pools are at different heights because they are using gravity to flow the water from one pool to the next, rather than a pump. Besides it being free, this oxygenates the water as it falls into the next pool. They are not raising the fish commercially at present, but give them to their workers.

Everything that Richard does is geared toward achieving the same goal, and that is to keep his farm economically viable and sustainable.

If farmers make money, farmers will farm.

Continuing to farm means continuing to provide food for the local community, employing people locally and making it possible for local people to stay in Hawai‘i: This as opposed to people having to leave the islands, or their children having to leave the islands, in order to make a decent life for themselves.

The hydroelectric system means saving thousands per month in
electric bills, and being able to expand into other products and activities. It means the farm stays in business and provides for the surrounding community. It means people have jobs.

This is the same reason why, on a bigger scale, Richard is working to bring more geothermal into the mix on the Big Island: to decrease the stranglehold that high electricity costs have over us, so the rubbah slippah folk have breathing room, so that we all have more disposable income – which will, in turn, drive our local economy and make our islands more competitive with the rest of the world, and our standard of living higher, comparably.

When he says “rubbah slippah folk,” Richard told me, he’s always thinking first about the farm’s workers.

This, by the way, is really a great overview of how Richard describes the “big picture.” It’s a TEDx talk he did awhile back (17 minutes). Really worth a look.

It was so interesting to see firsthand what is going on at the farm right now, and hear about the plans and the wheres and whyfors. Thank you, Richard, for a really interesting and insightful afternoon.

Hydroelectric, Lowering Electric Rates, Sustainability, Water

Visitors To The Farm

June 3, 2013 Richard Ha 3 Comments

Richard Ha writes:

We had a lot of visitors one day last week. All, like us, were very excited about the possibilities surrounding ag and energy at the farm. Agriculture and energy are inextricably intertwined.

The visit was arranged by Matt Hamabata, Chief Executive Officer of the Kohala Center, of which I am a board member. He brought researchers from Cornell University, as well as representatives from UH Hilo and Kamehameha Schools.

From UH Hilo, Cam Muir and consultant Greg Chun. From Cornell, Max Zhang and Robert J. Thomas. Matt Hamabata from Kohala Center. From Kamehameha Schools, Mahealani Matsuzaki, Neil Hannahs, Giorgio Caldarone, Sydney Keliipuleole, Llewelyn Yee and Marissa Harman.

This reservoir supplies all the irrigation water for our vegetables. The water comes down from an intermittent stream. Soon, the water pumps that move the water and pressurize the lines will be electrified from the old plantation flume.

See the blue tanks in the distance? That’s a tilapia experiment, where we oxygenate the water by using falling water rather than electricity. This is another way to leverage the abundant water that falls on the farm: We get 2.3 billion gallons annually on our 600-acre farm.

Construction of the head works: connecting up the old part of the flume with the new part. (Left) James Channels, produce buyer for Foodland Supermarkets and (right) Kimo Pa, farm manager at Hamakua Springs.

We took them up to the head works, where the old part of the flume system joins up with the new. As we looked downslope, someone mentioned how amazing it is to think that the sugar people moved the sugar cane to the mill by portable wooden
flume structures that they moved from field to field. We were standing about three miles upstream of the sugar mill.

Next we went to the hydro turbine shack to see where the water we borrowed 150 feet upslope is returned to the flume after energy is extracted. From there, overhead lines take the electricity to our packing house.

The turbine before

The turbine after

We have a vision of lining the south side of the flume with native trees. Their shadows would fall across the flume and suppress invasive species at the same time.

Back at the packing house, I told them about diversifying our produce mix. A papaya farmer wants to work with us, producing and labeling non-GMO papayas. Also, I visited an organic farmer in Opihikao yesterday. He is interested in getting heat-sterilized coconut coir to use as media for his certified clean ginger seed business. I told him I will keep him in the loop.

Later, Laverne Omori, the new Research and Development Director, came by with County Energy Coordinator Will Rolston. Vincent Kimura, of the INNOVI group, was at the farm helping us install an ozone food sanitation system. The beauty of this system is that we won’t have to use chemicals for sanitation treatment.
The only thing left over will be plain water.

Here’s a “before” picture with some previous visitors, Claire Sullivan and Steve Carey from Whole Foods.

And this short video shows “after.”

We want to use the electricity we get from the river to help area farmers produce more food. The bottom-line, inescapable fact is that if the farmers make money, the farmers will farm.

Geothermal, Government, Lowering Electric Rates, Mauna Kea, Peak Oil

Geothermal Talk at the Democratic Party Convention

May 22, 2013 Richard Ha 1 Comment

Richard Ha writes:

On Saturday, I was on a geothermal panel at the Hawai‘i Island Democratic Party Convention, which was held at the Volcano Art Center. Senator Brian Schatz speaking

Also on the panel were State Senator Russell Ruderman and former Big Island Mayor Harry Kim.

It went very well and I’m very optimistic. I think most of us just want to do the best for all of us.

I made it a point to tell the audience that I went to O‘ahu on behalf of the Big Island Community Coalition and testified in favor of four
geothermal bills. What the four bills had in common is that they all contained provisions for “home rule.” I told the audience: This was so you could have a say in the geothermal issue.

My main point was that we are competing with the world for oil. And we need to seek a competitive advantage for the Big Island, and this has to do with cost.

We all know that the price of oil price rise; it’s only a matter of when, and how high. So if we can find a lowest cost solution, this will protect us from a rising oil price. It does not matter what the alternative is, so long as it gives us a competitive advantage.

Right now, it’s geothermal that has the potential for giving us that competitive advantage, assuming we don’t drive up its cost so high that we lose that advantage. Whether or not we achieve its potential is up to our leaders and to the Puna community.

Here’s what I told the Democratic Party Convention:

We are on a search for “competitive advantage” for the Big Island. Organisms, organizations and civilizations do this – it is called “survival of the fittest.” It isn’t the strongest or the smartest that survive; it’s the ones that can adapt – Charles Darwin

My name is Richard Ha. I am a farmer here on the Big Island. Together with our 70 workers, we farm 600 fee simple acres at Pepe‘ekeo. We have produced multi-millions of pounds of bananas and tomatoes over the past 35 years.

In my search to find competitive advantage for my farm’s future, I’ve now been to five Association for the Study of Peak Oil (ASPO) conferences.

Here is what I took away from these conferences:

Oil price quadrupled in the last 10 years.
The last 11 recessions were associated with a spiking oil price.
Oil is a finite resource.
The world has been using three times the oil it has been finding for many years now.
The days of cheap oil are over.
1. The cost to produce the marginal barrel of oil – the last barrel, as in shale oil and tar sands – was $92 per barrel in 2011.
The U.S. mainland uses oil for only two percent of its electrical generation. Hawai‘i uses oil for more than 70 percent of its electrical generation.
1. Anything manufactured on the mainland with cheap oil embedded makes our local producers and manufacturers less competitive. This affects Ag products.
It is not the supply or demand of oil that will cause the
greatest damage; it is the cost of oil.
How much time do we have? Because it is about oil cost, we have less time than we think.

ELECTRICITY ON THE BIG ISLAND

Uses 180 MW at Peak.
Most of the increase in electricity bills is caused by oil pass through.
Bio mass – as in wood chips – and geothermal have base power potential.
Solar and wind must add storage to become useful as base power.
Storage at utility scale is prohibitively expensive today.

ECONOMY

Big Island electricity rates have been 25 percent higher than O‘ahu’s rates for as long as anyone can remember.
The Big Island has the lowest median family income in the state.
The Pahoa School Complex has, at 89 percent, the highest percent of students participating in the free/reduced lunch program in the state. Ka‘u at 87 percent and Kea‘au at 86 percent are close behind.

Education is the best predictor of family income. Yet the Big Island’s high electricity cost takes away from its education budget.

Rising electricity rates act like a giant regressive tax. The folks who are able to leave the grid for PV do so. The folks left behind pay more for the grid. Many of these folks are the ones already on the lowest rungs of the economic ladder: THE ONES THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY IS CONCERNED ABOUT.

Rising electricity rates take away discretionary income. Two-thirds of our economy is made up of consumer spending. Bottom-up economics benefit all, from the rubbah slippah folks to the shiny shoe folks.

GEOTHERMAL

Cost to generate electricity from geothermal is estimated at 10 cents per kilowatt hour. This is less than half the price of electricity generated by oil, which is estimated to be 21 cents per kilowatt hour.
The cost of the feedstock steam will be stable for a long time. The Big Island is estimated to be over the “hot spot” for 500,000 to a million years.
Concentrating geothermal on the East Rift increases risk. Iceland mitigated the risk by keeping some oil-fired plants in operational reserve.
Home Rule. The Big Island Community Coalition, myself as representative, personally voted for four of the bills that contained the Home Rule provision.
Mediation vs. contested case hearing. It is a risk/benefit, cost, competitive advantage question. The lowest cost solution to accomplish the objectives is our target.
How much time do we have? If cost is our primary concern, we have less time than we think.

I asked Dr. Carl Bonham: What happens if the oil price hit $200 per barrel? He replied that it would devastate our tourism industry.

I asked Dr. Bonham: What if we used geothermal as our primary base power? Wouldn’t we have a competitive advantage to the rest of the world as the oil price rose? He said, “YES.”

And, I asked, isn’t it fair to say that our standard of living would rise? He said: “YES.”

By giving the Big Island a competitive advantage in electricity rates, we can take care of all of us; not just a few of us.

WHERE ARE WE TODAY?

We are on a good track.

We have 38MW of geothermal. The 25MW original contract, which is still tied to oil, is being renegotiated right now.
HELCO has signed a 22MW power purchase agreement with Hu Honua. This is proven, stable and affordable technology – firewood, boil water.
HELCO has issued a 50MW request for geothermal proposals.

These 110MWs of stable, affordable electricity base power represent 60 percent of the Big Island’s peak power usage.

O‘ahu has 10 percent of its base power electricity coming from stable affordable sources.

If we all work together, to take care of each other, we can be on track to have a competitive advantageover the rest of the world.

***

Some good resources on this topic:

Geothermal Assessment & Roadmap is a report compiled by the Pacific International Center For High Technology Research (PICHTR) under contract to Hawaii Natural Energy Institute, University of Hawaii in January 2013.

Peak Oil Warning From an IMF Expert: Interview with Michael Kumhof is a modeling done by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) economic team. Although it is not an official IMF document, it was done by the team that does economic analysis and modeling for the IMF.

We are dependent on air transportation, and this video, Charles Schlumberger: Out of Gas: Implications for Transportation, gives a sobering view of what we can expect in the future. Dr. Schlumberger is head of the air transport division of the World Bank.

Eating Locally, Food Security, Lowering Electric Rates, Renewable Energy Sources

About To Throw the Switch on our Hydro

May 20, 2013 Richard Ha

Richard Ha writes:

Our hydro is all hooked up and we are ready to throw the switch.

HELCO is meeting with whoever they meet with on O‘ahu on Tuesday, and we will get instructions for the Standard Inter Connect. We cannot wait.

We will have stable and low-cost electricity. This will give us the ability to refrigerate and consolidate produce for area farmers. We plan to expand the number of farmers and type of crops growing on our land.

We are looking into growing portabello mushrooms, and are in the process of growing our first batch. When we get into commercial production, we will end up with compost and that will allow us to get into organic food production. The electricity we generate will help the controlled atmosphere and sterilizing process.

We are also in the process of getting into aquaponic fish production.

Lots of exciting things going on.

Government, Lowering Electric Rates

Farmer: “I’m Tired of Defending My Life’s Work”

May 15, 2013 Richard Ha 2 Comments

Richard Ha writes:

Yesterday I testified before the Hawai‘i County Council. I was testifying against Act 79, which would prohibit GMOs not already growing on the Big Island.

Note: We do not grow any GMO on our farm.

But the point I was wanting to make is that farming used to be an honorable profession where you could make a living. Now farmers are losing money right and left, wondering whether they will continue to farm, and they are not encouraging their children to do so.

If we farmers are going to survive, we are going to need access to the most modern techniques and technologies. This Act would cut off our ability to use modified crops that are resistent to disease, if needed. It would mean foregoing potential help, like when the banana industry faced a virus 15 years ago. At that time, they started working on genetically modified techniques that would have helped the banana industry greatly, though ultimately it didn’t happen.

Genetic modification also saved the papaya industry here in Hawai‘i; without the Rainbow papaya, we would no longer have a papaya industry at all.

Jason Moniz also testified yesterday. He was representing the Hamakua Farm Bureau and requested the bill be killed, saying it threatens the “well-being” of farmers and ranchers.

“Frankly, I’m sick and tired of having to defend my life’s work,” he said.

This feeling is increasingly being discussed at dinner tables in the farming community. They are asking themselves, “Is it worth it” to continue farming?

What will happen when all our farmers get out of the business?

My testimony:

My name is Richard Ha, and I’m representing Hamakua Springs
Country Farms.

Hamakua Springs Country Farms is a 600-acre, fee simple,
diversified Ag farm. We have produced multi-millions of pounds of fruits and vegetables over the years. We have 70 workers who work with us and have more than 30 years of experience in producing food

1. Farmers are being pitted against each other. This is not good. We need all farmers to help provide food for an uncertain future.

2. Farmers have been losing ground, not gaining ground. Even if you give farmers free rent, it is not guaranteed that they will make money. A UHERO report shows that ag, as a percentage of GDP, has been steadily declining. Food security depends on farmers farming. If the farmers made money, they would farm.

3. Farmers are right now making plans to quit and sell their lands. They cannot tell their children with a clear conscience to carry on, when all they see is conflict and no support.

Here is a solution. Cheaper electricity can give us a competitive edge. The mainland uses oil for only two percent of its electricity
generation. We use it for more than 70 percent. That is why farmers have a hard time doing value-added. Any food manufactured on the mainland with electricity embedded in it has a competitive edge over us.

Seventy nine percent of the students at the Pahoa School complex take advantage of the free/reduced lunch program, and qualification is determined by family income. That means the Pahoa area has the lowest family income in the state! Pahoa is number one in the state. Ka‘u is second, and Kea‘au is third.

Our electricity rates have been higher than Oahu’s for as long as anyone can remember. That means less of our education dollar is going to actually teaching Big Island students. Yet, education is the best predictor of family income.

If we could lower and stabilize our electricity cost, farmers,
distributors and retailers would have lower refrigeration costs. Food costs would go down. Farmers could manufacture value-added food products and increase their income stream. Lower cost electricity means people would have extra spending money to support local farmers. More of our education dollar would go to kids’ education, thereby increasing his/her chance of gaining a higher family income.

Two-thirds of the economy is made of consumer spending. If the people had extra money, they would spend it. Businesses would benefit and there would be more jobs.

There is no free lunch. Let’s concentrate on finding out where we can give ourselves a competitive advantage and go do it. We need to look at the bigger picture. Not “no can.” CAN!

Biofuel, Lowering Electric Rates

My Star-Advertiser Op-Ed: Big Island Biofuels Project Would Raise Oahu’s Electric Rates

May 1, 2013 Richard Ha 1 Comment

My Op-Ed article on the Aina Koa Pono situation, and how it would raise electricity rates for O’ahu residents (though the project is on the Big Island), ran in yesterday’s Star-Advertiser. Here it is in full:

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The Public Utilities Commission (PUC) is considering approving
a contract between Hawai‘i Island’s HECO-owned utility (HELCO) and a partnership known as Aina Koa Pono (AKP). Its decision is expected within the next several weeks.

Why should rate payers on O‘ahu care about this proposed
contract?

Because if approved, O‘ahu residents would pay about 90
percent of the cost – even though the very expensive fuel would only be used on the Big Island.

The contract between HELCO and AKP calls for HELCO (and you) to purchase fuel from AKP at about $200/barrel. Today, a barrel of oil costs about half that: $107. If this contract is approved, there will be a surcharge, to cover the difference, on your monthly electricity bill.

Furthermore, note that whenever oil has reached about $120/barrel, world economies have slowed precipitously. Many have gone into recession. This tells us that there is a natural economic “stop” in place that keeps oil from getting anywhere near $200/barrel.

And yet HELCO/HECO is trying to guarantee AKP a fixed price
of $200/barrel.

While a discussion of using renewable energy, rather than
primarily buying foreign oil, is warranted, when the cost of those renewables is so unrealistically high that any buyer would look for other alternatives, then that discussion has reached the point of absurdity.

What lower-cost alternatives exist for the Island of Hawai‘i?

The Island has significant geothermal resources at the equivalent price of $57/barrel. Right now, HELCO purchases only about 70 percent of the geothermal power available, meaning there is more geothermal available at well below the equivalent of $200/barrel.
HELCO currently purchases power from biofuel and hydroelectric sources that make a reasonable profit at today’s prices, and don’t ask for $200/barrel. Additional power plants are asking to come on line at today’s prices.
HECO and HELCO currently buy solar power at prices well below the equivalent of $200/barrel (in fact, from what we can tell, at less than half that price).
HECO and HELCO buy wind-generated power for far less than $200/barrel, with more potential sellers lining up to sell to them.

AKP’s plan has technical issues, as well. The process AKP plans to use has never been proven at the scale they propose; the proposed
yield of source material is many times more than ever grown anywhere. There are also cultural and environmental issues.

Finally, you might ask why O‘ahu rate payers should pay for power consumed by rate payers on another island. GOOD QUESTION.

The simple answer is that if rate payers on the Island of
Hawai‘i had to bear the burden, there is no way this could be approved. That kind of tells the whole story right there, doesn’t it?

We suggest you write to the PUC if you oppose this contract:
hawaii.puc@hawaii.gov. You can also contact your State and County legislators and your Mayor.

Richard Ha, owner of Hamakua Springs Country Farms,
submitted this on behalf of the Big Island Community Coalition, of which he is a founding member. Other founding members include Dave DeLuz Jr., John E.K. Dill, Rockne Freitas, Wallace Ishibashi, Ku‘ulei Kealoha Cooper, Noelani Kalipi, Ka‘iu Kimura, Robert Lindsey, H.M. “Monty” Richards, Marcia Sakai, Lehua Veincent and Bill Walter. All operate as individuals and do not represent others. The Big Island Community Coalition (BICC) works primarily with cost issues on the Island of Hawai‘i, where residents pay about 25 percent more for electricity than do O‘ahu rate payers.

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