Altogether, the farm had 31 inches of rain over the weekend.
Granted, it was a long weekend (from Friday to Tuesday morning). But still, 31 inches of rain is an awful lot.
It was 873,000 gallons per acre, or 499 million gallons of water falling on the entire farm. A half billion gallons of water. Amazing.
So here in Hamakua, we’ve had to rethink some things. Like our choice of pets:
And, also, our fashion choices:
Kapono and I had the truck loaded with lettuce, bananas, Japanese cucumbers, green onions and five types of tomatoes, and we were just about to leave for the Kino‘ole Street Farmers Market Saturday morning, when we heard a Civil Defense weather alert announcing that severe flooding was imminent.
We looked at the weather satellite image of the Big Island and it was bad.
Here’s how it looked at 9:35 a.m. Hawai’i time Saturday morning. The blue shows the remnants of the moisture-laden air that came up from the south and dropped on land as it was pushed inland by the northeast tradewinds.
Outside, there was pounding rain with thunder and lightning. Lightning always makes me concerned for my employees’ safety. I had to make a decision: Should we go to the Farmers Market, where customers might be waiting for us, or go to the farm to see how our workers were doing? No choice—we drove to the farm.
Along the way we saw streams that are normally dry but were running at very high levels because of the storm. Roads were closed, warning lights were flashing and water was flooding across the main roads. Police and public works personnel were out in yellow rain gear directing traffic.
(All photos by Kapono Pa, except #6 and #12 were taken by Richard.)
When we came to the Bayfront Highway, we could see a few vehicles standing in water halfway up their windows.
The soccer fields and Pau‘ahi Street, which runs down from the County Building, were entirely flooded and blocked off.
We drove across the singing bridge and looked upstream. The Wailuku River was an angry beast. It looked like serpents were writhing downstream, their smoke shooting in the air.
At the farm, everybody and everything was okay. The Soil Conservation plan we follow, which retains all the former sugar company’s diversion berms, diverted the storm water just as planned. The sugar industry was on that land for 100 years before us, and they knew a thing or two about coping with heavy rains.
In 24 hours, 11 inches of rain fell at the farm, or 297,000 gallons per acre. This means 177,309,000 gallons fell on our 597-acre farm in 24 hours. I tried to explain to the County Council that the drainage is good in our area and we do not need special rules on flooding.
After checking everything—such as noting where the water was high and where we need to shore up the berms—we drove back to Hilo along the winding, scenic route.
The river beneath the six-ton bridge was raging. It was clear to me that if the bridge gave way and we fell into the water, there would be zero chance of survival. For a moment it entered my mind to turn back. But, I thought, this road has been here for more than 100 years and it was once the main route to Kona. We
drove across it, but it was unnerving.
Waterfalls down a hillside on the scenic route
We took the cutoff to Wainaku so we could drive across the second concrete bridge and look at the Wailuku River up close. Kapono took a picture of a couple of kids at the park in Pu‘ueo, doing what comes naturally in a big, flooded yard—running as fast as they could and seeing how far they could slide.
We parked and walked on the bridge. One had to speak up to be heard over the river. It was kind of scary.
Then we walked up to the third bridge; the one alongside the river and behind the Federal Building. There were lots of people out doing the same thing. There was mist in the air from the churning water careening over waterfalls and bouncing off the river walls. The next bridge upstream looked vulnerable, and I wondered if there was even a remote chance that the concrete supports under us could be undermined by the tremendous force of the water. It was a humbling experience.
We humans think we are in control. But witnessing the force of nature makes us realize that we are just passing through, and that we need to keep in mind that we aren’t in charge here.
At the very best, we are caretakers. We need to pay attention to what we’re doing.
I just got a call about planning for the next “Chef Du Jour,” which is a fundraiser for Easter Seals. Boy, time flies.
It’s a food event that Chef Alan Wong and his friends have supported for many years.
The celebrity chefs of Hawai‘i
My grandson Kapono, talking story last year with Lt. Governor and Mrs. Aiona and State Department of Agriculture Director Sandy Kunimoto
Dan said, “I’m touching bases with last year’s participants; what do you think?”
Butterscotch, strawberry and chocolate ice cream with blueberries and Hamakua Springs apple bananas. Yum!
I told Dan that we would like to participate again and that the farmer/chef connection was great.
June with Oprah’s personal chef, Art Smith
I even enjoyed the plane rides back and forth to Chef du Jour last year, and took these pictures.
Mauna Loa (left) and Mauna Kea (right)
Hamakua Springs from the air
Flying into Hilo airport from the south
I’m looking forward to doing it all again this year.
The U.S. Department of Energy and the State of Hawai‘i announced an unprecedented partnership Monday. The Hawaii Clean Energy Initiative is a brand new partnership between the state and federal governments that aims to have Hawai‘i producing 70 percent of its energy from renewable sources by 2030.
At this point everything is still conceptual, but the state has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the U.S. Department of Energy and this is a major step in the right direction.
I am very much encouraged by this collaboration between the State of Hawai‘i and the U.S. Department of Energy.
It was two years ago that I started noticing creeping price increases. Farmers are some of the first people to see the effects of rising oil prices. Fertilizer, chemicals, irrigation, cooling packaging and transportation costs are directly related to oil prices. A year ago, it started to be very worrisome and I knew there was something serious going on.
In October I was the only person from Hawai‘i at the Association for the Study of Peak Oil (ASPO) conference in Houston, where I learned more about Peak Oil’s consequences than I ever wanted to know. Because Hawai‘i is 90% dependent on foreign oil, I knew we were dangerously vulnerable.
I returned from that conference knowing that we in Hawai‘i needed to wean ourselves from fossil fuels or else would go into an unimaginable downward spiral. So I volunteered to sit on the Hawai‘i County Energy Commission. I also volunteered to sit on the Kohala Center’s board, because of its good work in the alternate energy field.
Until Monday, though, when the Department of Energy announced its Memorandum of Agreement with the state regarding alternate energy, I really did not see how we could educate enough people in a short enough time to ensure political support for serious alternate energy projects.
This announcement is a very big deal.
I now feel we have enough momentum to start moving forward. In fact, I think we have enough momentum now to do what we need to do in order to protect ourselves from the consequences of Peak Oil.
Here at Hamakua Springs we are constantly trying new things.
• Last year we started growing lettuce hydroponically. It seemed like an easy thing to do, but we always expect the unexpected. And sure enough, we had insect, algae, bacteria, temperature, light, nutrition and heat problems.
At first we could not determine what was causing our problems. But because we had temperature, humidity, light as well as oxygen, nutrition and oxygen reduction potential meters we finally figured it all out.
We started with one box of lettuce, and now we are taking seven boxes to the Kino‘ole Street Farmers Market every Saturday morning and selling out.
After a year of experimenting we are finally happy with the green and red leaf lettuce.
• We are getting ready to start making biodiesel from waste vegetable oil. We will be working with Bridget Awong, General Manager of SODEXHO, the people who do food service for the University of Hawai‘i at Hilo. We will get 100 gallons per week from them.
We plan to create just enough biodiesel for our farm’s tractors and delivery trucks. We don’t plan on becoming an energy company. We just don’t want to get caught in gas lines when there are supply interruptions in the future.
• We also plan to make biodiesel out of algae. The idea is to use our waste fertilizer to grow the algae, and use the electricity we generate from hydro power to automate the process. This makes sense to us. Picking up nuts from the ground or harvesting palm nuts from trees is too costly and much too labor intensive for our taste.
• We are currently in another expansion mode. We are constructing about 40 new hydroponics houses right now, where we will grow more tomatoes, lettuces and colored bell peppers.
We can do this because we have the growing end of it worked out now, demand is up, and we see a lot of opportunity to provide food for this island in an energy-efficient way in the near future.
June and I were so honored to be invited to ‘Imiloa for an ‘Ohana Night get-together held Wednesday night for the families of teachers and staff of Keaukaha Elementary School. The folks from the Gemini Observatory put on a program for the small kids.
The whole night came about because of the Adopt-a-Class project and the energy generated by this worthy project. First Peter Giles, director of ‘Imiloa, gave a brief introduction. He talked about the Hawaiian culture’s connection with the heavens.
Back in May or so, I told Peter about our new Adopt-a-Class project and that we wanted to tie it into ‘Imiloa’s Hawaiian culture-oriented approach to science. I asked Peter if he would talk story with Kumu Lehua Veincent, principal of Keaukaha Elementary.
Peter did not expect Lehua to come see him, as some people in his position might have. Instead, he went to see Lehua. It was an acknowledgement that there is nothing more important than teaching the keiki. And at their meeting, Peter seemed to instantly understand that this is a special place—a special school.
I could tell that the experience affected him profoundly. Now he is learning Hawaiian language from Kumu Lehua. Peter is one of those people who “get it.” I have a lot of respect for him.
At ‘Ohana Night, we went into the planetarium so the children could get a sense of how many different cultures looked at the sky and gave names to the star combinations. They got a feel for the moon’s relationship to Earth.
When we returned to the “classroom” we were asked to demonstrate how far away the moon is from the earth, and other puzzling questions.
June and I were pleased to see the “ripple effect” of our Adopt-a-Class program, as these young kids from Keaukaha have experiences and exposure that will only help to open up their universe.
More than anything, we came away feeling how privileged we are to help teachers accomplish their goals by bringing together people who believe, like us, that there is no more noble profession than to teach our children.
Some photos from the ‘Imiloa ‘Ohana Night:
“Okay, your job is to make 50 balls of equal size from this 1 lb. ball of Play-Doh. If you make one ball represent the moon, and then roll up the 49 other balls into one big one, you will see the relative size of the moon to the Earth.”
That’s Kumu Lehua. He says, “Why can’t learning be fun?”
“Okay, we have to do this right! They said the ratio is 49 to 1, not 49 to 1.2!”
“Okay, so what you think?”
Aunty Luana says: “Take the string and make it 30 times the diameter of the Earth, and when you stretch it out, that will be the distance from the Earth to the moon.”
“Again, students: Thirty times the thickness of the Earth is the distance from the moon to the earth. Got that?” They might have gotten that for the rest of their lives.
I visited Puna Geothermal Venture (PGV) yesterday. It is located past Lava Tree Park, approximately a half mile beyond the “Y” on the way to Kapoho. The property consists of about 500 acres, and the actual production facilities stand on about 35 acres.
Several things impressed me. There are no smoke stacks, and it is an entirely closed system. There are video cameras and monitors to keep track of the environmental quality. And it is set up to be redundant. There are several injection wells and several production wells, each of which can be shut down for maintenance or in an emergency.
How it works: Steam and water come up from the ground, the steam spins a turbine, and then, together with the water and noncondensable gasses, it is reinjected back into the ground.
Very straightforward.
Although I am no engineer, I could tell that in its basic elements it is like the HELCO plant next to Lili‘uokalani Park. The essential difference is that there is no need for oil to make the electricity, and there is no smoke.
I estimate it must cost 1/3 more to build a geothermal plant than it does a conventional, diesel plant—give or take. But a geothermal plant’s daily operating costs must be substantially cheaper, because it doesn’t bear the cost of having to burn oil.
I know firsthand how expensive this can be. We used to run a smoky diesel generator to pump water for our farm. Now we gravity flow the water instead, and we smile all the time. This is the difference between geothermal- and diesel-fired electric plants.
In the last 15 years, the geothermal power plant has saved Hawai‘i from burning more than 5.5 million barrels of fossil fuel. Imagine if that oil had cost $100 per barrel; this would be a half billion dollars in saved oil purchases.
But it’s a little more complicated than that. It doesn’t matter if PGV is very cost effective because this cost is not passed to Hawai‘i’s people, nor to HELCO. And PGV is not happy. It would rather sell power at a cheaper rate and be able to expand its production.
How can it be that PGV wants to sell electricity cheaper, but cannot as regulations prevent HELCO from making any money at all on geothermal electricity? The result is that we cannot expand geothermal power, even if it’s the answer to our energy cost problems and we all want it.
Who’s in charge here?
I thought I heard the governor say, in her State of the State address yesterday, that she is trying to allow government agencies to buy power from independent power producers. It seems to me that the County Board of Water Supply, which is one of HELCO’s largest customers, and OHA, at Banyan Drive, will want to buy their power—much cheaper—from Puna Geothermal. People will be thrilled to see their “fuel adjustment” disappear!
Today we’re going to tell you a little story.
So there are these people with a farm who grow really good tomatoes and other produce.
Richard and June Ha, owners of Hamakua Springs Country Farms
And there’s this guy who runs a culinary program at Hawai‘i Community College.
Chef Allan Okuda, visiting Hamakua Springs
And this celebrity chef whose Honolulu restaurant was recently named 8th Best in the country by Gourmet magazine.
Alan Wong at a Hamakua Springs cookout last year, chatting with Richard’s mom Florence Ha
They are all in cahoots this year—they’re getting together and having a Tomato Recipe contest. You might have heard Richard talking about it recently on KWXX with Mynah Bird.
Radio personality Mynah Bird (right) likes to cook, and said he might submit a recipe. Richard said they’d have to omit his name to make it fair, and Mynah Bird said, “Don’t do that!” Everybody laughed.
Contest categories this year are Entrees; Soups & Bisques; and Preserves & Condiments. If you were going to enter, you’d send us your original recipe by January 31st.
After our judges go through the entries, students in Chef Okuda’s food service program at HCC will prepare the top ranking recipes. Here’s how it looked last year.
A student explaining the finer point of presentation to Richard
HCC food service students toured Hamakua Springs last year before the contest
Then the judges, including Chef Alan Wong, will sample the recipes.
Richard and Alan at Hamakua Springs last year; and below, last year’s judges
The whole thing will be taped and aired on Kama‘aina Backroads.
Roland Torres of Kama‘aina Backroads and Leslie Lang of this blog
Some absolutely amazing dishes in each category will earn a lucky few some very nice cash and gift certificates.
Back row: Chancellor Rockne Freitas, Marlene Hapai, Chef Okuda; front row Chef Sandy Barr with two students
Winners from the neighbor islands will be given a roundtrip ticket on Go! Hawai‘i’s Low Fare Airline so they can come tour Hamakua Farms on the Big Island with Richard.
And all because they read the official entry info and emailed us a recipe before January 31st.
YOU could be one of our winners, you know. Send us that recipe soon!
You hear a lot these days about the idea of using palm oil as a source of biodiesel fuel.
Here’s how Big Island farmers think about it. They ask: “So, how much money I going make?”
Let’s see. Say oil is $100 per barrel. There are 42 gallons of oil per barrel, so 1 gallon of oil is worth $2.38. As there are about 8 lbs. of water to a gallon, 1 lb. of oil is worth about 30 cents.
It takes maybe 2 lbs. of nuts to make 1 lb. of oil.
So when oil is $100 per barrel, farmers will make 15 cents per lb. of nuts.
When oil reaches $200/gallon, farmers will make all of 30 cents/lb.
When oil is $300/gallon, they’ll make 45 cents/lb. But they’ll already have lost their farm by then.
No sense, lose money!
Somebody said kukui nuts can be used to make biodiesel, too. But nobody like hire anybody to pick up the mac nuts that stay on the ground right now. No sense, lose money.
Maybe hydroelectric is the answer. After you pay for the pipe and generator, no need fertilize. No more harvest cost. No need work weekends. Eh! No need work.
Same like geothermal! More about that soon.
Gloria Baraquio visited the farm recently and taped a segment with Richard for the program Living Local, which she and her sisters do for cable station OC16. The segment is running now.
It repeats throughout the week on this schedule:
Wednesday, 1/16 at 5:30 a.m. and 9:30 p.m.
Thursday, 1/17 at 3:30 a.m. and 2 p.m.
Friday, 1/18 at 10 a.m.
Saturday, 1/19 at 2:30 p.m.
The show’s tagline is “All Sisters, One Show, Totally Local.” Here’s how the high-profile sisters describe their 30-minute weekly program:
Hanging out Hawaiian-style, eating Pacific Rim cuisine, listening to island rhythms, meeting local celebrities and learning about the kama’aina culture is exactly what Living Local® is all about … Concluding its fourth year on the air, “Living Local with the Baraquios” is a half-hour family entertainment TV talk show that features all the great people, places, things and fun history about Hawaii. The high-quality production is presented through the eyes of young, professional women, who just happen to be sisters. All are born and raised in Hawaii.
The show appeals to Hawaii residents and visitors of all ages. Its intention is to promote the local culture and concept of family through visual and compelling stories.
Living Local with the Baraquios airs on Mondays at 8pm on OC16, and shows multiple encore presentations throughout the week.
If you get a chance to see the segment this week, please let us know. We’d love to hear what you think. —posted by Leslie Lang