Editorial: Redouble efforts on solar energy

The clock is ticking for Hawaii to make its major shift away from fossil fuels and toward renewable sources, but it seems forces that should power that shift are not fully aligned.

The countdown can be heard most clearly in the looming deadlines for retiring key utility power generation plants, ostensibly replacing that electricity with the output of new large-scale solar-plus-battery arrays.

The most immediate target is September 2022, when by law Hawaiian Electric is due to shut down the Oahu coal generators at the AES Hawaii plant in Kalaeloa. Now the completion date for the solar facilities has been delayed until after the coal plant retirement, and there’s discord over how to generate electricity in the intervening months.

Further, there’s a move in the Legislature to cut back on private solar installation tax credits. This seems especially poorly timed given the likely impact on an industry’s workforce at a time of job insecurity.

What’s needed is a clear demonstration from state leaders that Hawaii means to realize its clean-energy goals, which otherwise amount to a can kicked down the road.

How can this be done? Gov. David Ige is putting some faith that a newly appointed group, convened this week, can at least ride herd on the process.

The “Powering Past Coal Task Force” is an entity to “timely facilitate, coordinate and align project development and reviews” by Hawaiian Electric, state and county agencies of renewable projects replacing coal.

It has no regulatory or policy-making power, but the governor, having created the task force by executive order, needs to follow through by putting the weight of his administration behind project execution.

Ige sent that signal after some clashes between the state Public Utilities Commission (PUC) and the electric company over yearlong delays in the timetable for completing the planned Mililani I Solar and the Waiawa Solar projects.

Because of those delays, the projects, envisioned as the replacement generators for AES, aren’t slated to come online until at least a few months after the coal-fired plant is due to switch off.

The PUC on Tuesday held a status conference with Hawaiian Electric on the transition, continuing a conversation ongoing for weeks about the coal plant closure.

James Griffin, commission chairman, certainly had pulled no punches in critiquing the utility’s proposal to revert to oil as an interim fuel.

“Your plan to me amounts to a shift from one fossil fuel to another,” Griffin said at a mid-March conference. “We’re going from cigarettes to crack.”

Strong words. But they appear necessary to keep things on track. Hawaiian Electric should redouble its efforts to accelerate the completion of the projects; the stakeholders in the task force — the PUC in particular — will need to keep the pressure on.

Additionally, the state Legislature needs to rethink the effect of House Bill 1174. That measure, with a title that reflected its original focus on film and media tax credits, was amended to slip in a passage cutting in half the renewable energy credit as well.

This incentive, which has helped to build Hawaii’s solar-panel industry by subsidizing installations on individual projects, might have needed fewer supports if not for the pandemic-caused economic decline. But in this economic recovery, it would be prudent to keep them in place to forestall additional job losses.

Hawaii has progressed on its transition to a clean-energy economy by 2045, but much of the low-hanging fruit is harvested. The drive to that goalpost will hit significant bumps, but when it does, it’s time for leaders to get out and push.