Only 2 more days until the first PUC public listening meeting at Hilo High School, and 3 more days until the meeting at Kealakehe High. The PUC wants to know what the public thinks about the proposed NextEra/HEI merger before holding its formal hearings in late November.
Read about it here, but most importantly, please show up at one of the meetings. This is probably the last chance in our lifetime to change our public utility and impact our future generations so positively.
I want to ask you to take a couple hours out of one evening and do something important.
This is probably, truly, the only chance in our lifetime to change our public utility and impact our future generations so positively. If you only ever do something like this once, this is the time.
The PUC wants to know what the public thinks about the proposed NextEra/HEI merger before it holds its formal hearings in late November. PUC members will be at Hilo High School on September 29th, and at Kealakehe High School on September 30th for “public listening sessions.” Both meetings will be at 6 p.m. in the school cafeteria.
Please speak up at one of these meetings and support the Hawai‘i Island Energy Cooperative (HIEC). It’s important we show up in numbers and let them know this matters to us.
The first PUC public listening session was held on Maui recently, and, even though it was scheduled on Labor Day weekend, Civil Beat reports more than 200 people showed up.
Here’s some background on HIEC: After the proposed NextEra/HEI merger was announced, some grassroots people put together a co-op model to run the Big Island’s electric utility, like Kaua‘i has had for 12 years now.
Although there was no willing seller, we decided to prepare in case the opportunity arose to purchase the Big Island’s electric utility. We raised money and hired professional people to help us enter the PUC discussions and get out the word. We are not against either NextEra or HEI/HECO, but are offering an alternative business model we think is best for our children and their children’s futures.
We think the co-op business model best prepares us for a changing future. The motivation is to keep costs low, not make profits for shareholders. And because it is run by a board of local people with staggered terms, it takes into account both community concerns and local perspectives of aloha ‘aina.
A co-op considers multiple energy issues – ground transportation, fertilizer and food, as well as electricity, which is why it’s called the Hawai‘i Island Energy Co-op. We operate with a broad view.
Also, instead of just maintaining the status quo, could we actually become competitive with the rest of the world? Because high costs force us to consider energy options not on the mainland’s radar, we even have the potential to lead the nation. Two-thirds of our economy is made up of consumer spending. Think how a money-saving energy co-op could improve the Big Island’s standard of living, and, more importantly, our grandchildren’s.
It also teaches future generations to adapt to change, and gives a world view that, “Not no can; CAN!”
Officially, HIEC is “a Hawaii-registered 421C non-profit cooperative association, was formed by community and business leaders on the island to explore and promote a comprehensive approach to develop an integrated, renewable and sustainable energy strategy for the Big Island of Hawaii.” You can read more about the merits of a community-based, cooperative ownership structure for electric utility service, and see the HIEC advisory board, here. Read our frequently asked questions.
Please put one of those dates on your calendar now, attend one of the Big Island listening sessions, and let the PUC know you support the Hawai‘i Island Energy Cooperative.
Some Thirty Meter Telescope protestors are writing angry comments saying I’m too military-minded, and I’m inciting violence up on the mountain. You can see them after this post. What I don’t understand, they write, is that they’re all about kapu aloha. It’s all about peace.
I remember being that age. I was invincible, and smarter than my parents back then.
Listen, I’ve been around for a long time. I’ve been there and done that. I don’t have anything against conviction, or fighting for what you believe in. I like all the energy, to be honest. I have a lot of energy, and I fight for what I believe in, too.
But I am against doing it in an unsafe situation.
Strategically it would be much smarter for the protestors to move their protest off the mountain and onto the flats. Then they could bring in as many people as want to be involved. They would not inadvertently get into a situation where someone – a loose cannon they don’t know who’s from somewhere else, maybe – causes a situation that goes very wrong because they are in such an unforgiving landscape. Loose gravel. Steep grades. Boulders.
It’s all about terrain. When the government looks at the situation on the mountain, they have to look at the road and the safety issues. It all comes into play, and to pretend it doesn’t is naïve.
If they were on the flats, no matter what the Supreme Court rules, the protestors could still protest. But if the Supreme Court rules in favor of the TMT and the protestors continue to hold their ground on the mountain and someone gets hurts, they’re going to look especially bad and people are going to get really angry at them.
There’s another issue now, too. Once I asked Lanakila, one of the spokesmen for the protestors, why the TMT protestors align themselves with the Kingdom of Hawai‘i. He told me they use the kingdom as a tool. He said those exact words: “as a tool.” What that told me was that it wasn’t about ethics. It was about the end justifying the means.
Now one of the kingdom’s kings has sent a letter to the governor and law enforcement agencies, as well as to the White House. It reiterates a message from a letter he’d previously sent, threatening to send marshals with weapons up to protect the protestors on the mountain:
If you truly are not willing to engage in negotiations to settle this matter, I am contemplating the deployment of my Marshals to Mauna a Wakea and Haleakala to support and protect my people from unlawful arrest and harassments by State law enforcement officers under your authority or the authority of State agencies. My Royal Marshals are Federal Officers of the Kingdom sworn to uphold and protect the Kingdom Constitution and Laws and the Orders of their King. Their protective services would be called upon to respond to violations of Treaty Law, the Laws of Nations and International Law, and to enforce domestic Kingdom Law.
The Royal Marshals are professionals holding the authority and power issued by me to carry side arms and other weapons to enforce the laws of the Kingdom of Hawai’i. Enforcement includes making lawful arrests to which the arrestees will stand accountable to the proper jurisdiction within our Courts. Anyone acting in violation of treaty law will be subject to arrest and prosecution within the Kingdom.
There’s no clear leadership in that protest. Who’s running that ballgame up there?
The bottom line is that the TMT is going to be built. The protestors are unwilling to compromise, which is hard to respect. They have no leadership, which I do not think is wise. And now there is a threat of someone coming in with weapons, which will always hang over their cause.
I mentioned before that, early on, when I was up on the mountain for a TMT ribbon-cutting ceremony, the protestors surrounded us in an L-shaped military ambush, and that never should have been allowed to happen.
Most of the people practicing kapu aloha on the mountain probably don’t know much about the military, but if the government ever called in assistance on the mountain, you better believe that sort of thing would be noticed. And whether intentional or not, it would make armed guardsmen nervous. That’s only one example of the sort of thing I hope never becomes an issue, and another reason I hope the protestors move their protest off the mountain.
Vietnam is where I learned basic military principles. Any Army or Marine veteran knows what I am talking about. There were three infantry companies in the valley we were in, and every so many weeks we’d rotate up to this firebase for about a week. It was up high, overlooking the valley with artillery to support the infantry companies. We could see all around in every direction.
I was 27 and it felt like R & R to us when we were up at the firebase, but it wasn’t. One day when we were up there, I was talking to the Colonel and he got all over my case because I wasn’t wearing my steel helmet. I got really irritated, but I had to swallow it because he was the Colonel.
Now I look at what’s going on up on the mountain and realize I’ve grown up. Somehow, I’ve become the one who sees the possibility of danger when the young, invincible, ones don’t. I’ve become the one who wants the young kids to wear the steel helmets so nobody gets hurt. This is what kupuna do.
I look back at the amazing flumes and the ditches that the sugar plantations built, and I wonder if those could even get built nowadays. We’d have a really hard time. I don’t know if we could.
Today we spend our time more time thinking of the reasons we can’t do projects like that than than actually doing them. It’s not the education of our people, it’s our attitudes. Too much “no can,” or excuses. Too much talking and not enough doing. We’ve become risk averse.
Rory Flynn wrote an editorial at Farmers & Friends called Progress and Progressives in Hawai‘i that’s a great read. It talks about how we are no longer innovative and excited about progress and big transformational change in our society.
He quotes Peter Thiel, a hedge fund manager and the co-founder of PayPal: “We wanted flying cars; we got 140 characters (Twitter).”
And he discusses our situation here in Hawai‘i:
We have niche opportunities to excel despite our far-flung geography and high cost of living. International collaboration in astronomy is one. Seed crop R&D is another. Renewable energy is one more giant niche opportunity – solar, wind, geothermal and ocean thermal conversion.
So what are we doing? We have declared war on two of the most promising sectors of our economy, the Thirty Meter Telescope and seed companies. What good does this do us? Well, it allows us to flex the emotion-laden muscles of sovereignty and aloha ‘aina. Meanwhile, our best educated youth depart for jobs on the U.S. mainland. And, in August, onlinedegrees.com declared Hawai‘i the worst state in the nation for graduates to move into post-college careers due to “relatively low employment opportunities” and the nation’s “most expensive housing market.”
Not so long ago, progressives in Hawai‘i believed in progress. They thought that innovation boosted the human prospect. Call it the “Burns Years,” post-statehood. There was a lively sense that Hawai‘i’s people could accomplish great things as they shed the plantation era yoke of “subtle inferiority.” As equality took root, an easygoing collaborative style blossomed. It tasked the Democratic Party to develop a new, diversified economy. It gave us raucous entertainments at Territorial Tavern, spirited conversations at Columbia Inn and policy wonk breakfasts at Washington Place. People might disagree – and often did – but it was understood that bad blood was bad manners. People knew when to say, “Eh, no act, brah.”
There’s a lot more – see what Boeing and Germany have to do with it, too.
The take away is that it’s really about trust, community, honor, all of us and not a few of us, and not, no can. CAN!
This situation on Mauna Kea continues to be a disaster waiting to happen. A Star-Advertiser reporter asked me what I would do about it.
I’m just a banana farmer, but one that happens to be a military veteran and knows a bit about military tactics. When I was up on the mountain early on for a TMT ribbon-cutting ceremony, I saw right away that the protestors had us in an L-shaped military ambush. That should never have been allowed to happen.
If this continues, more and more protesters will be up there. Are you willing to take the chance that no one rolls a boulder down the mountain? And then the situation escalates, we bring in the National Guard, and somebody shoots? If this keeps going on, somebody is going to get killed.
It’s so clear to me. We need to get our law enforcement people involved and plan for the worst case scenario. Or we can continue to be gentle and somebody will get killed. I have seen this in action in Vietnam. It’s something to see. It is so much better to be safe than sorry.
From the beginning of this situation on Mauna Kea, I’ve been very clear that this is very serious. What’s important – no matter which side of the argument you are on – is safety. We have to maintain public safety.
photo Vadim Kurland / CC by 2.0
(HILO, HAWAII, SEPTEMBER 8, 2015)—Hawaii Island Energy Cooperative (HIEC) has retained the veteran firm, Hastings & Pleadwell: A Communication Company (H&P) to do public outreach about the benefits of a utility cooperative for Hawaii Island.
For 20 years, H&P has provided communication services to clients in Hawaii and beyond, many of them concentrated in the alternative energy or technology arenas.
Barbara A. Hastings, a founding partner of the firm, has been following and writing about energy matters since the Arab Oil Embargo of the mid-1970s. She was an energy fellow in the Stanford University program for working journalists.
HIEC is in the exploratory and public education phase, seeking to inform Hawaii Island residents of the potential, and merits, of self-ownership of its local electric utility.
With the successful Kauai Island Utility Cooperative as a model, the HIEC board is exploring cooperative utility ownership for its island.
“H&P proved a good fit, given its roots on both Hawaii Island and Oahu, and its background in the energy field,” said Marco Mangelsdorf, HIEC board director and spokesman.
HIEC was founded earlier this year and is an intervener in the Public Utilities Commission proceeding reviewing the proposed sale of Hawaiian Electric Industries, including Hawaii Electric Light Co. (HELCO), to NextEra Energy of Juno Beach, Florida.
Some of the cooperative benefits HIEC wants to communicate include potentially lower energy rates over time; financial gains go directly to members, not shareholder profits; and local, democratic control of the island’s energy future.
Ashley Kierkiewicz, a Hawaii Island native, will lead part of the outreach efforts and partner Barbra Pleadwell will assist with strategy. H&P has offices in Hilo and Honolulu.
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About Hawaii Island Energy Cooperative
HIEC is a non-profit cooperative association that seeks to establish a member-owned electric utility and encourage non-petroleum-based transportation for Hawaii Island. HIEC presents a unique opportunity for all electricity consumers to “own the power.” For more information, visit www.hiec.coop. HIEC is on Facebook and Twitter @HiEnergyCoop.
The Big Island PUC will be holding Public Listening Sessions re: the proposed NextEra/HEI merger at Hilo High School on September 29th at 6 p.m., and Kealakehe High School on September 30th at 6:00 p.m. PLEASE ATTEND to say you support the Hawaii Island Energy Cooperative. It matters!
Mina Morita is former chair of the Hawaii State Public Utilities Commision. At her Energy Dynamics blog, she wrote the post Let the Consumer Advocate & PUC Do Their Jobs!
I generally agree with what she writes. Referring to a wave of politicians who want to explore a public utility option instead of the proposed NextEra/HEI merger, she writes:
During this time of transformation a well-functioning electric utility requires insightful leadership, nimble and flexible strategic planning and strong analytical capacity.
That is exactly why a group of community leaders and business persons formed the Hawaii Island Energy Cooperative. When the proposed NextEra/HEI merger was announced late last year, we arranged for a briefing by the KIUC folks. It looked very promising, so we formed a steering committee. At that time, though, there wasn’t a willing seller so we waited to see if there would be an opportunity down the road.
The other day I spoke as part of a League of Women Voters forum. I told the moderator, Pearl Johnson, that we decided to use the Wayne Gretsky strategy. Gretsky said to skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it is. That’s an example of insightful leadership. We decided to prepare a co-op option in case an opportunity arose. If we had waited to start when an opportunity came up, it would have been too late.
The co-op model allows for nimble and flexible strategic planning. I told Pearl Johnson that it isn’t the strongest, largest or smartest that survives, it’s the one that can adapt to change.
A board of directors directs a co-op model. In the case of Kaua‘i’s co-op, nine members sit on the board. The terms are staggered and every year three positions become vacant, which allows the co-op to quickly respond to changes. It is especially important now because declining natural resources require us to be nimble, flexible and strategic, as Mina points out.
What we should consider is which business model will give the next generations tools they need to cope in an uncertain future.
There are many qualified people the board can hire to help with technical analyses.
The HIEC is not opposing the NextEra/HEI merger. What we are doing is positioning ourselves to be a viable option.
The Big Island has a huge advantage in working to achieve 100 percent renewable energy. We already have 40 percent renewables, and HELCO itself projects 92 percent renewables by 2030. It appears that we could probably avoid LNG entirely.
When I visited Iceland several years ago, they showed us an oil-fired plant that had been on standby since the 1970s. We could do that, too. I don’t see many opportunity costs foregone. If we change nothing at all, the co-op model would still have the advantage of some tax savings.
If we are successful in acquiring HELCO, we will need legislators to work with us to make legislation that will encourage the usage of “curtailed” (thrown away) power.
As we move toward the future of 100 percent renewable energy, we must remember that this is about all of us, not just a few of us. The co-op has an incentive to lower costs.
So yes, we do agree with Mina. We’re waiting.
A Civil Beat article lists more than 40 politicians interested in exploring the idea of a utility cooperative or other options, rather than the proposed for-profit NextEra/Hawaiian Electric merger.
From Civil Beat:
A diverse group of more than 40 elected officials wants more options on the table as the merger deal between NextEra and Hawaiian Electric is being considered.
More than 40 state and county lawmakers united Thursday in a commitment to explore the potential of public utilities in Hawaii.
Their announcement comes as the Public Utilities Commission considers approving the proposed $4.3 billion sale of Hawaiian Electric Industries to Florida-based NextEra Energy.
…“Public utilities don’t need higher rates to make profits for shareholders, and as a result they tend to have significantly lower rates than for-profit utilities across the country,” state Rep. Chris Lee, who heads the House Energy and Environment Committee said at a news conference in the Capitol.
He was flanked by 20 other lawmakers who support looking at fundamentally changing the monopoly for-profit utility model that has served Hawaii for the past 100 years.
Among the supporters was Honolulu City Council Chair Ernie Martin, who said the county will be the biggest consumer of electricity in the state, even surpassing the military. Council members Ikaika Anderson and Kymberly Pine joined him.
House Minority Leader Beth Fukumoto Chang, along with fellow Republican Rep. Cynthia Thielen, also said the public utility option needs to be explored.
“As Republicans and Democrats, we have differences,” Fukumoto said. “But we can all agree that the skyrocketing cost of electricity is detrimental to local familites. Until NextEra provides a framework for customer savings, it would be irresponsible not to explore options like co-ops and other alternatives.”
Chris Lee also spoke about this on Hawaii Public Radio recently. Listen here (10:11):
I cringed when I saw this morning’s Hawaii Tribune-Herald article NextEra Adviser: Co-ops Not Cost-Effective. Now NextEra, the company hoping to acquire Hawaii Electric Industries (HEI), has a Massachusetts-based spokesman speaking for it.
NextEra says it’s sensitive to Hawai‘i, but this spokesman is from Massachusetts. It’s exactly what many of us are wary of – mainland advisors with no idea of the complexity of the issues. The NextEra spokesman didn’t even seem to know that the Big Island has an abundance of natural resources quite different from what’s available on the mainland.
NextEra says if it purchases HEI in its proposed $4.3 billion deal, it would let us have an advisory board – but that doesn’t really mean anything. An advisory board wouldn’t have any power. It would be the same thing as a representative to Congress back in the Territorial days.
NextEra would be investor-owned, which means its goal would be to make money for it investors and shareholders. That would be the priority. If it benefits the Hawai‘i ratepayer at all, that would be incidental.
Contrast that with the co-op, which is non-profit and it is not taxed (that savings is returned to the ratepayers). Right there, even without making any other changes, a co-op already saves money compared to an investor-owned utility because it pays no taxes.
The co-op is not going to tell you exactly what it is going to do. We are going to set the framework so we and future generations will always be equipped to make decisions and do what is best as conditions change. There’s no way we can know now what the future holds.
Co-ops have a nine-member board of directors, with each member having a staggered term. Every year, three positions come up for election. This keeps it sensitive to what’s going on in the community. The co-op’s board structure is a self-correcting mechanism that is responsive to what the people are thinking as attitudes change over time. You don’t see that in a powerful company that’s located far away.
A company like NextEra tells you what it’s going to do and then locks it in – because that’s how it makes money for its investors. Not because it works for the local community, or saves money for ratepayers.
Keep in mind, it’s not the biggest or the strongest that survive; it’s the ones that can adapt to change. NextEra is by far the biggest (but so were the dinosaurs, and they’re not around anymore).
Hawaii Island Energy Cooperative is big enough (it will be part of a 900-member cooperative association with its own, healthy, financial institution) and it’s about adapting. It’s about doing what we have the opportunity to do for the Big Island right now – changing our energy utility to a cooperative model – so we, and future generations, can adapt to changing conditions as needed, and survive and thrive.
