 Hello and welcome to PowerUp Hawaii where Hawaii comes together to walk towards a clean, renewable and just energy future. I am your host, Raya Salter. I'm an energy attorney, clean energy advocate and community outreach specialist. I'm also the principal attorney of Imagine Power LLC. But now let's go ahead and take a look at important recent energy and utility lose from Hawaii around the country and the world. So once again, Hawaii takes leadership on clean energy. Hawaii is building the first public hydrogen vehicle fueling station in the state. I believe there are a couple, but this is big. Actually, I think this is the first, the first. So Hawaii is building its first public fueling station for hydrogen vehicles, which will enable the state to begin selling cars that only emit water vapor. So Honolulu based Servco Pacific is building the station, which it plans to complete in early 2018. Once it's operational, the company will begin selling the hydrogen fuel Toyota Mirai. So according to our governor, I really do see today's event as the beginning of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles in Hawaii, says Hawaii Governor David E. Gay on Wednesday at a groundbreaking for the station. So what are these things? There are only 38 hydrogen fueling stations nationwide, mostly in California, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. So South Carolina, Connecticut and Massachusetts also have stations. There are more than 1,600 consumer vehicles powered by hydrogen in the U.S., including the least vehicles. And they're also mostly in California, said Maury Markowitz, president of the Washington Base Fuel Cell and Hydrogen Energy Association. So in Hawaii, there are just a handful of hydrogen fuel vehicles primarily used by the military, which has its own fueling stations, said Stan Arsiman, co-think tech host and director of the Hawaii Center for Advanced Transportation Technologies. The Toyota Mirai can go for 312 miles before it needs to refuel, which only takes about five minutes, said Mark Fukunaga, chairman and CEO of Servco Pacific. So Servco is spending several million dollars to build Hawaii's first public fueling station without any grants, without any government funding. The company will charge in the mid $50,000 range for the Mirai, which includes the cost of hydrogen fuel for the first three years. And the station will also serve buses or any other hydrogen fuel vehicles, he said. So wow, here is another time when Hawaii is taking real leadership on clean energy. We've got a private company that's going to invest in doing this, and really there are so few hydrogen vehicles in the country, much less the state. This really is an investment in the future, and this company must feel that the island environment, the economy, and the other factors here in Hawaii make it a good investment investing in the future. I think this is extremely exciting. We've talked before about the idea of 100% renewable transportation goal in Hawaii. And I do think that that's excellent, and we are working towards having some guidance in the last leg session. But I think more important than putting up goals, an aspirational goal for this particular issue is really making some concrete steps to forward the infrastructure that's needed for electric vehicles here. I would love to see Hawaii, the state of Hawaii, the city commit to public transportation, and also government fleets to use clean energy. Perhaps hydrogen would be a model for that. We've got so far to go in terms of developing clean transportation infrastructure, and this I think is an excellent development, and great that this company is looking to invest and hope to be seeing a lot of exciting things from hydrogen cars. It's another thing that's an interesting technology development, not so much technology war, but in a way, policy always has to come and sort of lead and also push some of the development of technology, particularly in the clean energy sector. Here, we've got electric cars led by Tesla, so exciting. I think everybody is looking forward to seeing the next model of Tesla, which is the first one that comes in that affordable range where sort of regular middle class folks and others can actually get into one of these sexy Teslas. But the idea of a hydrogen car also makes a ton of sense. I think it's been mostly used in buses, but let's see what happens and what kind of technology plays out and what type of policies come forward to support the best technology and the best answers for the state. I always say, as an advocate, I always attempted to remain technology neutral. We don't want to put our eggs in one basket for any particular private company, but I think we want to see these companies thrive. We want to see the competition in this market. We want to see solutions developed and we want to see solutions that mean affordable, clean transportation options for the people of Hawaii, so very exciting. The next story, Hawaiian electric companies meeting with land owners and renewables developers, so to help achieve Hawaii's renewable energy goals, of course, the vast amount of which Hawaiian electric is responsible for, he co-recently sought out landowners to determine their willingness to host renewable energy projects. As a result of that effort, the utility company says it has compiled a list of potential sites that could be available to experienced developers and Hawaiian Electric is getting ready to issue formal requests for proposals for renewable energy projects there. So Hawaiian Electric says it will require all developers to engage with communities near-proposed renewable energy projects and solicit public input before developers can negotiate a final agreement with the utility company. All agreements will require approval from the Hawaii PUC. So in December 2016, Hawaiian Electric, including its Maui Electric and Hawaiian Electric Light subsidiaries, achieved nearly 26% of the state's renewable energy mandate across the five islands served. Hawaii Island, for example, has the state's highest level of renewables, at 54%. With new developer agreements recently approved by regulators, it is expected that more than 80% of the electricity used by Hawaiian Electric Light customers will come from renewable sources by 2020. Hawaiian Electric says it is now moving even more certively to encourage renewable projects development, while federal tax incentives that can lower prices for customers are available. So the company has requested PUC approval to start the regulated procurement process and expect soon to issue formal RFPs for developers to propose grid-scale projects. When contacting Hawaiian Electric, developers must sign an NDA, that's a nondisclosure agreement, and provide information to demonstrate experience and capability in completing renewable projects. This is a big, important development that has me feeling some kind of way to be completely honest with you. I've talked a lot on this show about environmental justice, climate justice, and land use. And I've talked about how land use is going to, I think, be one of the hugest environmental justice issues going forward. I think that we've come to a point in environmental justice advocacy where we are seeking empowerment for local communities to have clean, to have, not only to have to be free from conditions that cause poisons in the air, in the water, in the plants, in the environment, conditions from power plants that can cause negative health impacts or from cars that can cause negative health impacts. Yeah, we want to see those things cleaned up. But they're also having a stinky power plant right next to where you live. We want that stuff cleaned up. We think those things should be equitably, the burdens and benefits of energy should be more equitably shared across the state. And that means now exactly what we're saying. We're talking about a more distributed world. We're talking about more distributed generation. So benefits include actual participation in the development of these projects so that the local communities can prosper from this energy and also experience ownership from this energy and benefit from lower, not only potential positive health impacts, but lower energy bills. It also means we want to see an increase of beautification of areas where there are already utility assets. And we want to see clean energy justice as well. That means access to clean energy. That means ownership of clean energy. And that also means figuring out a fair way to place these assets around the island. We want to get to 100% renewable energy. What's that mix going to look like? How much of it is going to be from solar? How much is it going to be from battery storage? Well, guess what? I don't necessarily want to live right next door to a microgrid or a solo farm anymore than I want to live next to any other type of utility asset. So there are tremendous land use and environmental justice implications to where these energy projects go. I personally find it slightly disturbing that this is something, and I think it's extremely important that he goes saying, look, all you guys are going to have to engage with the community and show that you guys are able to do projects before we are allowed to do these projects and answer these RFPs for us. But I think there's a place for public policy here. I think we need more of an ad hoc discussion of communities talking about particular properties without being able to see the big picture and how these distributed assets are going to affect their community. These are the other communities. I'd like to see some public policy from the state and county address how these assets are going to be used and what the effects are these assets going to be and who is going to benefit from them. So I think this is an extremely important issue in development, one that I encourage further discussion and I encourage more public weighing in now rather than later on what I think could be the biggest environmental justice, some of the biggest environmental justice issues related to energy and clean energy that these islands will face. Moving on to what I think is another great story. HPU, Hawaii Pacific University is partnering with Hulu Energy to bring solar panels to Aloha Tower Marketplace. So NSYNC Energy has announced a 20 year power purchase agreement with Hawaii Pacific University to build a 310 kilowatt solar PV system on the rooftop of the Aloha Tower Marketplace in downtown Honolulu. Under the agreement, NSYNC Energy will build a solar installation at Aloha Tower and this is a mixed use space that features university student residents, residences, community spaces, restaurants and shops. So the development represents HPU's continuing investment into the marketplaces revitalization since it acquired the property in 2014. So says HPU, we appreciate the opportunity to partner with Hawaii Pacific University on bringing reliable renewable energy solutions to the marketplaces many residents and visitors. So this is Dan Nordlow from NSYNC Energy. NSYNC, according to Dan, has proprietary modeling for system design and financial optimization, making sure that the system delivers the best financial value based on HPU's current and future power needs. So installing solar panels on the green rooftops of the iconic Aloha Tower is a highly visible symbol of the state's clean energy leadership. So HPU weighs in, our decision to adopt clean energy is part of our commitment to our students and the future of Honolulu and Hawaii, says Bruce Edwards, Chief Financial Officer for Hawaii Pacific University. Partnering with NSYNC Energy was simple as they eliminated the complexity of the process and brought the expertise of delivering reliable cost-effectively energy. This project is the first phase of our renewable energy deployment and we are looking forward to additional possible projects in the future. So HPU leases the Aloha Tower marketplace from the state of Hawaii Aloha Tower Development Corporation and corporation chair Darrell Young applaud the investment into the property and HPU's commitment to renewable energy. This partnership and the resulting project are significant steps towards modernizing the marketplace and reaching the state's goal of 100% renewable energy for the future of Hawaii. So yes, I have to say, we wanna see a great project happen and we hope it successfully happens on or under budget for HPU and the other stakeholders involved. But I think it is exciting when we've got major infrastructure, major landmark infrastructure that is making the switch to renewable energy. And I think we're gonna talk a little bit more now about how we have this goal, why it's important. So we will do that in just a few, we're gonna take a break and then we will come back with more Power Up Hawaii Aloha Edition. This is Think Tech Hawaii, raising public awareness. Welcome to Hawaii. This is Prince Dykes, your host of The Prince of Investing, coming to you guys each and every Tuesday at 11 a.m. Right here on Think Tech Hawaii, don't forget to come by and check out some of the great information on stocks, investments, your money, all the other great stuff, and I'll be your host. See you Tuesday. But grandmother, what big eyes you have. She said. What are you doing? Research says reading from birth accelerates our baby's brain development. Push! Ah! Read aloud 15 minutes, every child, every parent, every day. Hello and welcome back to Power Up Hawaii. There's been some really important stories we've been talking about today that really I think deeply involve issues of environmental justice and the symbolic nature of clean energy. And I think it's important to say, you know, 100% clean and renewable energy, why? You know, I think that I've been a long time advocate of RPS goals and they're really important. When I think about what they kind of meant when they sort of first started coming forward, I think there's sort of a lot of good will and enthusiasm for clean energy. You know, folks understand, most folks understand that climate change is real, that we have spent the past 100 years pumping so much carbon into the environment that it is starting to turn back on us and is threatening to destroy our survival as human beings in our way of life. And that clean energy can be a way to reduce that. And I think there's also a good will towards the idea of receiving our energy from the sun, from the waves, from nature, as opposed to digging up this ancient fossil resource and burning it for our energy. I think we all understand that energy is key to all of our lives and that access to energy is extremely important. And I think we also have more and more in recent years with things like the Dakota Access Pipeline becoming more visible, understand that using these fossil resources can have real consequences, economic consequences but also environmental consequences and also public health consequences. They can potentially threaten water supplies. They can threaten the cleanliness of our air. And that includes hydraulic fracturing for natural gas, which is also a fossil fuel resource. And that the idea of having energy that comes from natural, abundant renewable sources, renewable, meaning that as long as we are here on this planet, I would so hope that the sun will shine on its cycles, that the waves will continue to continue on their cycles. So I feel like there's a tremendous amount of good feeling and good will and hopefulness about clean energy and the potential for renewable energy to sustain us. In the meantime, there are a lot of issues about both the cost of energy and the cost and technology of these clean energy assets. We are not in a place where capturing, you know, these clean resources is as easy as one, two, three. And we've got a tremendous private industry competition. We have government support. We have less government support now under the Trump administration that is attempting to move this technology forward and make it more something that we can use day to day. So now here in Hawaii, where we have the highest energy costs in the entire country of the United States due to the need to import fossil fuel to burn, we know we've got a place where it makes all the sense in the world to have clean energy. But what does that really mean? Beyond the good feelings, beyond the good will, beyond the theoretical and the visionary aspects of it, what does it really mean? And I think that now here in the islands, we have a 100% renewable energy goal now for a few years now. We have the utilities looking at how to power it forward. And what is that actually going to look like and what is it going to cost? I posit that without some assurances of economic benefit to ratepayers and to the state, query the importance of the number 100%. Two other things we've talked about many times on this show before. It is important for the state of Hawaii to reduce its carbon footprint. But why? Has Hawaii contributed to the emissions that are causing catastrophic climate change? No, very, very, very little. What are the reasons that we need to have these distributed energy systems? Primarily for the islands, A, yes, we want to show the rest of the world and have moral authority if we can do it, you can do it. But for the islands, we're really talking about resilience more than anything else. How are we going to adapt to climate change? How are we going to prosper without our energy and utility infrastructure? We are not going to be able to prosper as a state, both as residents or hosting and growing businesses or having tourists or anything else. So how are we gonna make sure that as the sea levels rise and we have increasing likelihood of severe weather events, how are we gonna make sure that our infrastructure stays in place? That is how the transformation of energy systems away from the central station power model towards a more distributed model sort of overlaps with the idea of resilience. So this means we have more distributed energy sources. Then we really need to think about those sources. Who owns those sources? How reliable are they? If somebody decides they're going to buy their own system for a particular community, say that they're building, who is responsible for providing service at any, you know, providing service for those folks who live there? What if the power goes down and it's privately owned? Should HECO or someone else have the responsibility to get the power back on? And who is going to profit from these projects? Will it be surely the developer? If an asset is going to be in your community, do you have the right to weigh in on that project? And should you have the right to have a model of ownership to participate in that project? I personally, as an advocate in New York state, said many, many times over, yes, the democratization or the opening up of the processes that have created this rather opaque financial regime for energy and utilities, which has kept the lights on for many years, kind of has to end as the distributed future sort of unfolds. So in New York, regulators, and we advocated very hard and regulators, approved different ways to make sure that low income folks and communities are able to participate in renewable energy projects in communities. One, in New York state, allowed for a developer to partner with a community association to do a clean energy, and work then also with the utility, which in New York city is Consolidated Innocent, Con Edison, to do renewable energy projects. And it also made some special conditions that utilities are allowed to participate in developing clean energy resources for neighborhoods where market failures, maybe you have low income people, maybe you don't have high enough credit rating, to allow those projects to move forward. And they've had problems with some of these programs. I think there hasn't been enough, haven't been enough folks with expertise to come along and connect the dots between communities and developers. Oftentimes developers do not come from within communities, they come from without communities. They come from out of state. So how can we make sure that local folks get a piece of the pie when it comes to the jobs that are created, when it comes to the businesses that are created, and when it comes to receiving the benefits when they are on the table for clean and renewable energy. So that is a new universe that I think needs to be more open in Hawaii and more discussions need to take place in order for that to happen. We need more avenues for public participation in the processes from the beginning. I think again, one of the biggest issues will be land use. What are we gonna use for 100% renewable energy? Biofuel, where are we gonna grow that biofuel? Are we going to use solar? Where are those panels gonna go? Who's gonna live next to those panels? Is it gonna be storage? Where are those batteries gonna go? What is going to be the nature of that? Who's gonna own it? What will the market look like, if any? And I think that having an ad hoc process going forward for this is not, we need to move forward, but we need to make sure that all the voices come to the table to really be a part of this discussion so that we can have a more just outcome and one that actually brings benefits to the people who live in Hawaii. A big part of that will be rate relief and a big part of that will be having more options for electric vehicles and transportation, for using your electricity, for making money off the grid, if you want, be it from your car, that can be a source of revenue potentially. So, and the story that I won't get into is about how the Big Island is actually developing, at long last, a biomass energy plant to burn some of the eucalyptus that has been sort of plaguing, was sort of developed initially to sell, I think, to Chinese paper interest after the fall of the sugar industry and then for reasons, for several reasons weren't able to be sold. So these things are happening. These things are happening here and now. Hawaii is taking leadership on making these things happen, but I think really the message of power up Hawaii has been we have to power up the constituents, we need to power up the stakeholders and we need to make sure that there are voices in the conversation, diverse voices in the conversation, that increase awareness, that help people understand what's at stake for them and their children and their children's children as we face climate change in these islands. So I hope that I have been able to help further bit of this conversation here on this show. Thank you so much for joining me and I wanna say a big, big mahalo to Think Tech, the whole crew, Ray and Rob and Jay, all the guys behind the scenes here that you can't see who are totally awesome and mahalo and thank you so much. Goodbye from power up Hawaii.