Renewable and affordable
Mr. Michael Brestovansky’s April 7 story (Tribune-Herald) on Puna Geothermal Venture’s amended power agreement highlighted opportunities to accelerate our transition to clean, firm energy.
Geothermal energy can enable our energy resilience and improve the cost of living and quality of life for Hawaii Island’s residents. We must explore ways to leverage our gift of energy in a manner acceptable to our communities and sustainable. (By the way, additional geothermal capacity need not be in lower Puna.)
Brestovansky mentioned how the amended power agreement will delink PGV’s power from the oil prices. This would allow for pricing predictability as PGV’s power prices will not be affected by rising oil prices. PGV’s agreement is commendable as it was initiated a few years before the expiration of its existing contract.
There have been other requests to other legacy providers to delink their prices. The Tawhiri Power wind farm at South Point is notable.
Tawhiri’s contract expires in 2027, and our utility has unsuccessfully requested delinking a couple of times over the past decade.
The article did not mention the pricing benefit of the new contract. PGV’s amended agreement calls for 6 cents per kilowatt-hour for the first 227,000 kilowatts, and 4 cents per kilowatt-hour beyond this! This firm power is many times lower than the rates proposed for the tree-burning plant (Honua Ola), starting at 21.5 cents per kilowatt-hour, and rising to 32 cents over the course of the 30-year contract.
Interestingly, PGVs rates are even lower than for solar-plus-storage.
Geothermal development is a complex and costly process. However, geothermal plants can provide an endless supply of affordable energy once deployed.
Of course, new plants can take decades to plan, design and build. This means we will need to rely on near-term solutions — solar, storage, wind and others that don’t emit — as stopgap and diversification measures. These near-term solutions must offer economic relief to our households, boost our local economy, mitigate the climate crisis, and contribute to a more sustainable environment.
This also means that we must invest in research and development to determine how best to leverage our geothermal resources.
With the right solutions, we can decarbonize our economy and reduce the cost of energy for everyone. This means affordable electricity bills, clean transportation, affordable food and a sustainable environment.
Noel Morin
President, Big Island EV Association