Police commissioner does her job, gets criticized

The city Ethics Commission is often handed fairly knotty questions to untangle. This latest conflict, though, between one of the overseers of city police and the former police chief, should be a slam-dunk for the ethics commission now reviewing it.

The scene this week involved Honolulu Police Commission member Loretta Sheehan, a critic of Louis Kealoha, who retired in the wake of a local controversy and an FBI conspiracy investigation, still ongoing.

Kealoha wanted Sheehan to recuse herself from matters involving him — but she declined, saying it’s her duty to ask tough questions. It’s hard to argue with that.

The latest in biofuels: the pongamia tree

Meet the pongamia tree, the latest entrant in the Hawaii biofuels test market. The legume produces large pods loaded with oils that can be converted into biodiesel, renewable diesel and jet fuel.

Alexander & Baldwin, which has experimented with biofuel crops for years, will lease 250 acres of former Maui sugar cane land to TerViva, a company in the pongamia business.

It sounds promising, as these proposals generally do. In addition to oil, the seed pods can be burned for energy and seed cake fed to livestock. But can it turn a profit?

That’s the million-dollar question, as yet unanswered.