Hawaii Clean Energy: Part 1 -- Goals and Reality

Hawaii's past history for electricity generation does not bode well for its "clean energy" goals.

Hawaii has a goal of reaching 40% renewable energy by 2040. Possible? Yes! Probable? Definitely not!

Here is why, based on our past history as documented in DBEDT statistics. I used 1993 as the reference year because in 1993 three large energy projects came online: Two on Oahu, the AES coal plant and the H-Power plant, and one on the Big Island, the Puna Geothermal Venture plant.

As a result of these large new power plant investments, oil consumption in 1993 dropped by 11.5% compared to 1992. Ten years later, in 2002 Hawaii was back at the 1992 level of oil consumption for electricity generation!

DBEDT statistics I could find had 2008 as the most recent year in the data series, so I used the 1993 to 2008 period and estimated that Hawaii energy needs increased by 12.75%. I assumed that this will be the growth of demand for electricity for 2025.

I also assumed that:
(1) Both oil and coal consumption will stay constant at the 2008 level.
(2) Covanta will successfully bring online a third "boiler" and increase power production by 50%, by expanding from 2 boilers to 3 boilers.
(3) Hydroelectric power will stay constant.

Based on these assumptions, all the additional energy will need to be produced from renewable energy sources. How much renewable energy does Hawaii need to add compared to its 2008 renewable power plant set?

• 300% increase in geothermal
• 300% increase in wind
• 300% increase in biomass, and
• 1,000% increase in solar

[Note: these are numerical examples of renewable energy shares that may satisfy Hawaii's electricity needs in 2025. These shares of renewable sources of electric power are not a recommended strategy for Hawaii.]

All these investments in renewable energy are only sufficient for keeping the oil and coal "dependency" constant at 2008 levels.

If these investments were to be executed in the next 14 years, Hawaii's renewable attainment will be 19.8% in 2025.


The pie-in-the-sky state goal calls for 33% renewable electricity generation by 2025. My 19.8% estimate is optimistic: If by 2025 Oahu has a working rail system and several thousand electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles, they will require much more electric power than the amount I used for my estimations of Hawaii's 2025 power needs. As a result, the renewable energy attainment will be lower than 19.8%.

It is critically important for Hawaii to (1) set realistic goals, and (2) ensure that the right types and technologies of clean and renewable energy are installed.

This article in the Hawaii Tribune-Herald contains some of my views on energy for Hawaii.

Cut, Cut, Cut -- Tax, Tax, Tax

Recent samples of governance by Cuts and Taxes, as published in Hawaii Reporter

Reckless Spending -- Panos' Version

Thomas Sowell wrote a great article on Reckless Spending in Real Clear Politics. I copied his article below and modified it for our Honolulu rail situation. The bold words are my edits to Sowell's article. Small world really... Washington reckless spending and Honolulu reckless spending is one and the same.

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Nothing more clearly illustrates the utter irresponsibility of Peter Carlisle than his advocacy of "rail." The man is not stupid. He knows how to use words that will sound wonderful to people who do not bother to stop and think.

High-speed rail may be feasible in parts of Europe or Japan, where the population density is much higher than in Hawaii. But, without enough people packed into a given space, there will never be enough riders to repay the high cost of building and maintaining a high-speed rail system.

Building a rail system between Kapolei and Honolulu may sound great to people who don't give it any serious thought. But we are a more spread-out country than London, Paris or Tokyo.

However little Mayor Carlisle knows or cares about economics, he knows a lot about politics-- and especially political rhetoric. "Rail" is simply word to justify continued expansion of government spending. So are words like "investment in education" or "investment" in any number of other things, which serves the same political purpose.

Who cares what the realities are behind these nice-sounding words? Carlisle leave that to the economists, the statisticians and the historians. His point is to win the votes of people who know little or nothing about economics, history or statistics. At the same time that Carlisle held his fake "ceremonial groundbreaking," he also blanketed his supporters with $150 to $1,000 per person Election 2012 fundraiser solicitation!

To talk glibly about spending more money on "rail" when the national debt has just passed a milestone, by exceeding the total value of our annual output, for the first time in more than half a century, is world-class chutzpa. The last time the U.S. national debt exceeded the value of our entire annual output, it was due to the cost of fighting World War II.

When World War II ended, in less than four years of American participation, we began paying down the national debt. But our current national debt has been expanding by leaps and bounds in peacetime-- and with no sign of an end in sight for the next decade.

Since more than 40 percent of our national debt is owed to foreigners, this means that goods and services produced by Americans, equal in value to more than 40 percent of our current output, will have to be sent overseas, free of charge, by either this generation or the generations that follow.

Since the generations that follow cannot vote today, the Obama administration's latest budget keeps the spending increasing, while regaling us with wonderful plans for big reductions in government spending-- years from now, after Obama is gone.

Make no mistake about it, spending wins votes, and votes are the ultimate bottom line for politicians. If fancy words and lofty visions are enough to get the voters to go along with more spending, then expect to hear a lot of fancy words and lofty visions.

One of the most successful political ploys is to promise people things without having the money to pay for them. Then, when others want to cut back on the things that have been promised, blame them for lacking the compassion of those who wrote the checks without enough money in the bank to cover them.

If all else fails, politicians can always say that we can pay for the things they promised us by raising taxes on "the rich." However, history shows that, when tax rates go up to very high levels, people put more of their money in tax shelters, so the government ends up collecting less revenue than before.

But history is so yesterday. What is far more exciting is to think of rail in the future, even if it is speeding us toward bankruptcy.

Dallas Light Rail: Costs Up, Ridership Down

Time and again mainland cities shine a (dark) light on Honolulu's future with rail. Of course given our tiny population size and huge rail construction costs, the actual consequences will be far worse for Honolulu than these "achievements" of the Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART), as summarized by the National Center for Policy Analysis:

• The fixed-route (bus and rail) ridership on DART is less than it was 10 years ago, despite population in the service area growing 17 percent since 2000.
• In that same period, DART has collected almost $4 billion in local sales taxes and hundreds of millions of federal tax dollars on a system that makes hardly a dent in area traffic congestion.
• DART's staff has grown from just under 2,800 employees in 2000 to 3,900 in 2010, an increase of 39 percent.
• For comparison, the Dallas district of the state Transportation Department -- which includes seven counties with a population of more than 4 million and oversees almost 11,000 lane miles of highways -- has fewer than 1,000 employees.
• DART's operating expenses from 2000 to 2010 grew from $242 million to $402 million, a growth of 66 percent to operate a system with declining ridership.
• Meanwhile, as predicted, the agency has reduced the number of bus miles to force ridership onto the light rail system, in many cases making the commute last longer for the regular rider.
• Every time a rider stepped on a rail car or bus in 2010, local taxpayers were paying a $4.45 subsidy for that ride, compared with $2.94 in 2000.
  

Reject the “Jobs” Justification for Transportation Projects

I fully agree with Robert Poole's article which in part reads as follows:

• On a tour of China, government officials took renown economist Milton Friedman to a major construction site, where Dr. Friedman expressed surprise at seeing legions of workers digging away with shovels. When his host responded that a major purpose of the project was to create jobs, Friedman replied that if that was the case, they should equip the workers with spoons instead of shovels.

• That point was underscored in a report issued last month by the Bipartisan Policy Center. “Strengthening Connections Between Transportation Investments and Economic Growth”, written by economist Douglas Holtz-Eakin and civil engineering and urban planning expert Martin Wachs.

• Instead of focusing on short-term construction job-creation, the authors argue for a focus on long-term returns from infrastructure investment. “Over the long-term, higher productivity—the ability to generate more output and income from each dollar of capital or hour of work—is the key to higher labor earnings and improved standards of living,” they write.

• Hence, infrastructure policy should select projects that do the most to enhance long-term productivity—as did the creation of the Interstate Highway System, which dramatically lowered the cost of personal and freight transportation, leading to the world’s most productive logistics system.

Speaking of highways, three California Congressmen are asking that the funds of the California high speed boondoggle be diverted to correct the ills of SR 99. Part of their positions is as follows:

• The economic and environmental benefits of SR 99 improvements are strongly contrasted by the uncertainty of California’s now infamous bullet train, which has been described by the national press as “the train to nowhere.” Providing the state the option to redirect high speed rail funding to SR 99 will give state and local leaders the opportunity to step-back from what is likely to become a bottomless pit of spending.

The bottom line is government needs to invest taxes in productive and necessary infrastructure. For Hawaii this means road repairs, water and sewer line repairs, and airport and harbor upgrades within our ability to borrow and pay. All these are necessary projects and with proper scheduling and financing they can get done without breaking the citizens' backs.

The airport modernization, and the Middle Street merge fix projects that Gov. Abercrombie wants to do should be done asap. The Mufi/Carlsisle rail boondoggle needs to be thrown in the trash. The accumulated rail funds should be used immediately for the Middle Street construction, the Honolulu airport upgrades and for the design of the secondary treatment facility mandated by the EPA for our Sand Island effluent treatment plant. Now these are construction and engineering jobs worth paying for.