Solar permits issued mixed in isle counties

Solar permits issued in Hawaii and Maui counties continue to head in opposite directions.

In Hawaii County, the 65 permits issued in September for solar electric systems were down 25 percent from 87 in the year-earlier period. But for the first nine months, PV permits were up 25 percent to 791 from 632, according to data compiled from Marco Mangelsdorf, who tracks rooftop solar permits and is president of Hilo-­based Pro­Vision Solar.

For Maui County, the solar numbers continue to be discouraging.

In the third quarter, the Maui electrical department issued 137 PV permits, down 8 percent from 149 in the year-earlier period and off 65 percent from the third quarter of 2016.

Over the first nine months of this year, Maui County issued 418 PV permits, down 18 percent from 512 through the same time frame in 2017 and off 70 percent compared to the same time frame in 2016.

“On Sept. 17, Hawaiian Electric was required by the (state Public Utilities Commission) to decide on the winning bidders to provide hundreds of megawatts of new utility-scale renewable energy generating capacity for Oahu, Maui and Hawaii island with the company vowing to make the details public after nailing down the power-purchase agreements sometime later this year,” Mangelsdorf said. “The combination of large-scale and roof top solar PV is dynamic and continues to beg the question as to what the best mix is between central and distributed generation. Those of us in the Hawaii solar industry are convinced that roof top solar, and an exponential increase in customer-sited energy storage, is an absolutely vital piece of robust and resilient island grids in our state.”