Energy Justice For All
What is energy justice?
Power for the people by the people ✊—an energy system that has moved away from a fossil fuel, profit-driven model to a system that is based in clean, renewable energy that works in the public’s best interest, including the health and well-being of the community and environment.
Picture it: A community-approved utility that provides direct, affordable electricity, powered by clean, renewable sources that do not impact public health or natural resources.
Our current system is broken.
Hawaiian Electric Company is a monopolized, profit-driven, powerful corporation that has long been entrenched in Hawaiʻi’s economic, political and social landscapes. Despite Hawaiʻi being at the forefront of renewable energy and carbon neutral goals, Hawaiian Electric remains heavily reliant on imported oil and continues to drag its feet on clean energy project development and innovation—leading to high energy costs and dirty or high impact power plants damaging our communities’ health.
Corporate owned. 💰
As a monopoly, Hawaiian Electric not only supplies an essential service to 95% of Hawaiʻi but benefits greatly.
Hawaiian Electric (powering Hawaiʻi Island, Maui County, Oʻahu) is owned by Hawaiian Electric Industries which also owns American Savings Bank and an investment firm, Pacific Current.
Entrenched utility. 😉
Being a monopoly also means that Hawaiian Electric holds incredible amounts of power and influence in decision making from County to State legislative bodies to regulatory government agencies.
Hawaiian Electric also had a hand in the illegal overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom in 1983.
Extremely expensive. 📈
Hawaiian Electric owns every aspect of the grid, from power generation to transmission to distribution. This means every step of the way, Hawaiian Electric sets the prices and profits off the business.
Hawaiian Electric also remains heavily reliant on fossil fuels, passing those high costs off to the customer like you.
Targeted siting. ⚠️
Hawaiian Electric has a history of placing both dirty and clean energy facilities near working class, rural, indigenous, communities of color, ultimately undermining community and environmental health.
Think: AES coal plant and Kahe power plant in Kapolei, and the Kahuku wind farm.
You can tell it’s broken because Hawaiʻi pays the highest electricity rates in the United States, paying 214% more than the average.
Hawaiian Electric ❤️ fossil fuels.
The reason our electricity rates are so high is mainly due to the price of oil (and the importing of oil…on ships that use more fossil fuels to bring the oil here), which is Hawaiʻi's main source of energy, along with the fixed costs of power plants and maintaining the grid infrastructure.
On an average day, roughly 65% of the energy Oʻahu uses is powered by oil.
Because the price of oil can fluctuate greatly, Hawaiian Electric sets the cost at the higher end… and this contributes to your high electricity rates.
And the burden’s on you.
The problem is that Hawaiian Electric passes on the high cost of oil to you, the customer, through the "Energy Cost Recovery Clause". On paper, it works both ways—with price increases and decreases—but in all actuality, customers hardly see savings when oil prices drop, such as during COVID-19 when oil prices were extremely low, keeping our energy burden high.
Hawaiian Electric’s slow transition to clean energy sources is costing you (and the environment).
🚨 Examples of Energy Injustice
AES Coal Plant + PVT
Hawaiʻi's last coal plant is in West Oʻahu. AES transports its toxic coal ash to the PVT landfill in Nānākuli, where it is used to blanket the day’s trash—harming the workers’ and surrounding communities’ health and air quality.
Kahuku Wind Turbines
The nation’s largest turbines placed near schools and homes in a rural working class community and near native bat habitats and a bird sanctuary—despite years of community opposition.
H-Power Waste to Energy
Hawaiian Electric contracts C&C of Honolulu to burn trash for power despite hazardous air pollutants and emissions of “waste-to-energy.”
Lack of Community Engagement
Utility-scale projects continue to be planned in indigenous, low-income communities, on prime agricultural lands, and/or raise concerns like stream diversion and land loss.
Energy (In)justice 2.0: Climate Crisis + COVID-19
In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Hawaiʻi Public Utilities Commission issued a mandatory utility shutoff moratorium due to non-payment, that has been extended through May 31, 2021. This quick action has helped to relieve immediate financial burden on Hawaiʻi’s families but the need for electricity bill financial assistance goes much deeper than COVID-19.
The same two factors fuel the climate crisis and the need for bill forgiveness during the pandemic—fossil fuels and greed.
Fossil fuel executives knew as early as the 1960s that their products caused detrimental changes to the world’s climate, leading us to the climate crisis we are in today. They used their power and money to lie to decision makers, the government and the people—in order to make billions of dollars a year for decades.
The need for bill forgiveness exists not only because of the impacts of COVID-19 but because Hawaiʻi’s electricity is so expensive. Hawaiʻi’s electricity rates are high because Hawaiian Electric has chosen to remain reliant on expensive fossil fuels, dragging its feet for years in the transition to renewable energy—to continue to make millions.
This greed and reliance on fossil fuels has historically made electricity rates so high in our islands that bills are difficult to pay. Now, in an economic downturn, many more are struggling to pay their bills. All the while, Hawaiian Electric made more money in 2020 than any year before.
The mandatory utility shutoff moratoriums have helped to relieve immediate financial burden but when the moratoriums are lifted, there will likely still be thousands unemployed and facing thousands of dollars in back bills and back rent. Our friends, families and neighbors need bill forgiveness and we need it to come from the for-profit monopoly that put us in this financial hardship with its high electricity rates. They can certainly afford it.
How we’re taking back our power ⚡
☀️ Renewables Can Save Us
If done well, clean renewable energy sources have the potential to lower our electricity rates and provide a cleaner environment. But we will need more than just large scale solar, which is what our monopolized utility is focused on now. Microgrids and residential rooftop solar is needed if we are going to reach 100% renewable affordable energy. But not everyone has access to a roof, right?
Hawaiʻi's high cost of living and low minimum wage means that almost half of Hawaiʻi's residents live in rental units. The majority of the population has no control over their energy sources or energy savings measures like solar water heaters and energy efficient appliances. There are solutions to provide affordable renewable energy to tenants but Hawaiʻi's utility and permitting process are holding us back...again.
Energy should not come at the cost of public or natural health. This means shutting down our dirty energy sources, like the coal plant in West Oʻahu and weaning off of oil. As we transition to clean energy, we must work alongside communities in the development of renewable energy projects and encourage microgrids and other small scale community energy projects instead of large scale windfarms or solarfarms.
🎩 Topple the top-down model
Then, we need to move away from the monopoly towards a public power utility, which would ultimately improve accountability and reduce rates. Public utilities are community-owned, not-for-profit electric utilities that provide reliable, affordable electricity that is safe for our neighbors and environment. Public utilities are part of the community and employ the community—diversifying our workforce and providing stable jobs closer to home. Small scale community solar provide the opportunity to those that do not have access to roofs—like renters or apartment dwellers—to have access to affordable clean energy.
At the very least, we need to decouple our utility and energy infrastructure. We need a mechanism like an independent system operator that oversees the grid, supplying energy loads based on real-time usage would ensure equal access, optimized costs for the ratepayers and fair competition.
In 2018, Hawaiʻi passed the Hawaiʻi Ratepayer Protection Act into law which establishes incentives for the electric utility to provide cheaper, renewable energy to its customers. As a for-profit corporation, Hawaiian Electric is beholden to its shareholders, not its ratepayers which has contributed to the extremely high rates that residents pay. This Ratepayer Protection Act is a step towards holding the utility accountable for providing affordable, clean energy to our community. The act is currently in front of the Public Utilities Commission for implementation and has yet to come into fruition.
The bottom line is that energy sources are a public trust resource in Hawaiʻi, just like our streams, land, water and air—and they should be cared for one and the same. Energy as a basic life necessity should not be controlled by a single corporation. Gone are the days of top-down fossil fuel wholesale energy systems—now is the time to take back our power for a brighter energy future.