Twenty-eight interested parties have filed to be part of the state Public Utilities Commission’s decision on whether to approve the sale of Hawaiian Electric Industries to Juno Beach, Fla.-based NextEra Energy Inc.
The state Energy Department, solar lobbying groups and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1260 are some of the groups that have filed to be part of the decision.
HEI, the parent company for the state’s three major utilities, and NextEra Energy filed a joint application with the PUC on Jan. 29, asking for approval of the $4.3 billion deal.
The PUC could take a year to 18 months to rule on the proposed purchase, acting PUC Chairman Randy Iwase said at a Capitol hearing Tuesday. Interested parties had until Wednesday to file to be an intervener.
The commission determines which groups are allowed to be included in the application process.
If the PUC approves all the interested parties, there would be 33 parties on the application including NextEra, the three electric utilities and the state consumer advocate.
If the parties are approved, NextEra and HEI are required to respond to the information requests they file.
"Because you are a party you get access to documents; you can ask questions, get answers and find out what is going on," said Henry Curtis, executive director of Life of the Land, one of the groups that requested to intervene. "They have to answer. They often supply documents. Many times documents are filed that would be difficult to find, if not impossible."
The PUC can deny interveners or restrict the parties to specific parts of the application.
The timeline for the PUC response to a request to intervene can last from a month to more than a year, said Curtis.
In the application, NextEra and HEI said there would be no involuntary workforce reductions for two years after the deal closes.
IBEW Local 1260 said it generally supports the deal but wants to make sure that NextEra honors the current agreements with the union.
Missouri-based SunEdison, a company that owns four wind farms in Hawaii with 150 megawatts of power, was another party that requested to intervene.
The renewable energy company said it did not have an opinion on the sale, but wanted to make sure that clean-energy competition continues in Hawaii. NextEra develops wind farms throughout the U.S. and sells the power to utilities.
"The continued successful development of such renewable energy projects by SunEdison fundamentally depends on the existence of a level playing field for the procurement and interconnection of new utility-scale renewable generation resources and for modernization and operation of the electric utility’s grid system," SunEdison said in its filing.
Other groups that filed to intervene include Renewable Energy Action Coalition of Hawaii, Hawaii Island Energy Coop, Kauai Island Energy Coop, Hawaii Water Service Co., Ka Lei Maile Ali‘i Hawaiian Civic Club, Maui County, Hawaii Solar Energy Association, Friends of Lana‘i, Puna Pono Alliance, Hawaii County, Ulupono Initiative, The Alliance for Solar Choice, AES Hawaii, Blue Planet Foundation, SunPower Corp., Tawhiri Power, Hawaii PV Coalition, Paniolo Power Co., The Gas Co., Hawaii Renewable Energy Alliance, the state Office of Planning, Sierra Club, Hina Power Corp. and the Honolulu Board of Water Supply.
