Tag Archives: University of Hawaii

Are GMOs Safe? Should We Label Them?

Richard Ha writes:

Genetically engineered food? Is it safe? Should it be labeled?

Mark Lynas was one of the original founders of the anti-GMO movement. In this video, he explains that he has totally changed his mind about GMOs, his original position was not scientifically based, and he now completely regrets it.

“I want to start with some apologies….For the record, here and upfront, I want to apologize for having spent several years ripping up GMO crops. I'm also sorry I helped start the anti-GM movement back in the '90s, and that I thereby assisted in demonizing an important technological option that can and should be used to benefit the environment.

“As an environmentalist, and someone who believes that everyone in this world has a right to a healthy and nutritious diet of their choosing, I could not have chosen a more counterproductive path and I now regret it completely….”

The video is called "Mark Lynas on his conversion to supporting GMOs – Oxford Lecture on Farming. Watch it here to learn why he changed his mind. (In short, he says he "discovered science.")

At its recent 2012 annual meeting, the American Medical Association adopted a
position on bioengineered foods
:

“Conclusions. Despite strong consumer interest in mandatory labeling of bioengineered foods, the FDA’s science-based labeling policies do not support special labeling without evidence of material differences between bioengineered foods and their traditional counterparts. The Council supports this science-based approach, and believes that thorough pre-market safety assessment and the FDA’s requirement that any material difference between bioengineered foods and their traditional counterparts be disclosed in labeling, are effective in ensuring the safety of bioengineered food.

To better characterize the potential harms of bioengineered foods, the Council believes that pre-market safety assessment should shift from a voluntary notification process to a mandatory requirement. The Council notes that consumers wishing to choose foods without bioengineered ingredients may do so by purchasing those that are labeled “USDA Organic.”

But organic farmers have high operating costs, and therefore organic foods are generally more expensive. How can we help organic farmers?

One way is to increase the discretionary income of organic customers. Geothermal-produced electricity puts money back in consumers’ pockets. Everyone benefits.

The large biotech companies aren’t going to come and plant and grow on the Big Island. Half our island is lava rock, and we don’t have long straightaways where you can set up irrigation. Lose money! 

Why do you think the sugar plantations used "tracked” equipment to work the fields? So they wouldn't flip over, or get stuck in the mud.

Big tractors that are used in Big Ag make money on the straightaways, and they lose money on the turns. We don’t have the straightaways, and so we don't have that type of Big Ag here – and we won’t.

Banning University of Hawai‘i field trials on the Big Island only hurts regular farmers. 

Can Geothermal Exist In Harmony With the Hawaiian World View?

Richard Ha writes:

On Thursday, Kalei Nu‘uhiwa and I spoke on a geothermal panel at the UH Manoa’s Richardson School of Law.

Kalei talked about Papakū Makawalu, a Hawaiian deconstruction of the universe into its basic component parts. Here is an interesting talk she gave on this topic about a year ago. (It’s about 13 minutes; well worth a watch.)

From the Edith Kanaka‘ole Foundation:

Papakū Makawalu is the ability of our kupuna to categorize and organize our natural world and all systems of existence within the universe. Papakū Makawalu is the foundation to understanding, knowing, acknowledging, becoming involved with, but most importantly, becoming the experts of the systems of this natural world.

At our panel discussion, the essential question was: “Can geothermal exist in harmony with the Hawaiian world view?”

Kalei’s answer, as I understood it, was, “Yes – If we have a full discussion ahead of time to assure that all concerns are adequately addressed. We need to understand and be comfortable in knowing what its effect on the Hawaiiian environment would be.”

I agree with this point of view. When we were asked what would we do if one of the geothermal developers did not agree to abide by this I said, “Then they need to get out of here!”

Hawaiians in pre-contact time were very successful. Here in Hawai‘i today, we are less successful.

This is why I really like Charles Hall’s EROI concept, which measures net energy. It provides empirical data that compares use of energy from ancient times to the present. It’s a way of comparing apples and apples across time.

Blessing or Curse? Native Hawaiians & Geothermal Energy

Tomorrow (Thursday, March 7, 2013) Richard will be sitting on a panel called Native Hawaiians and Geothermal Energy: Blessing or Curse? It's at the University of Hawai‘i at Manoa's Richardson School of Law.

Kalei Nu‘uhiwa is also on the panel, which takes place from 11:45 a.m. to 1 p.m. Free and open to the public. We invite you to come and learn more about this subject!

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– Leslie Lang

Dr. Charles Hall Speaking at UH Manoa Today & Tomorrow

Richard Ha writes:

Professor Charles A.S. Hall is giving two free lectures on O‘ahu. One is today at the University of Hawai‘i at Manoa. It’s at 3:30 p.m. in the Architecture Auditorium.

The second is tomorrow, January 10, 2013, from 4:30 – 5:30 p.m., also at UH Manoa. It’s at Holmes Hall 244.

His talk is titled “Peak Oil, EROI and Your Financial Future in Hawai‘i.”

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We’ve been going around. I took Charlie and his wife Myrna up to see the sunset at Maunakea.

Here is Dr. Hall talking with Mike Kaleikini, general manager of Puna Geothermal Venture, as we toured the Puna Geothermal plant.

With mike kaleikini

Professor Hall is a hands-on guy. At the farm, he took off his shoes and got into the flume. He started turning over rocks in order to evaluate the health of that environment. It is relatively impoverished, he said.

Hands on

At ‘Imiloa Astronomy Center, he talked to Master Navigator Kalepa Baybayan, who has captained voyages to the South Pacific and back using traditional navigational methods. Kalepa was describing how certain star clusters move in the sky as your position changes.

At Imiloa

We had coffee with with Monty Richards at his home. He is a wealth of information and history. He told us about the possibility of combining wind and 600′ pump storage using sea water, so one is not limited by the availability of fresh water. Although the soil is porous and cannot hold water, his reservoirs are lined with cheap plastic, which is common on the Big Island.

Monty Richards

UH’s Greenwood Holds Positive ‘Listening Session’ at UHH

Richard Ha writes:

President M.R.C. Greenwood of the University of Hawai‘i just had another of her listening sessions; this one at the University of Hawai‘i at Hilo.

MRC Greenwood with other UH, UHH and HCC heads

Left to right: Joni Onishi, Hawai‘i Community College Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs; Don Straney, Chancellor, UH Hilo; Linda Johnrud, Provost, UH System; M.R.C. Greenwood, President, UH; Carl Carlson, UH Regent; Barry Mizuno, UH Regent. (Not pictured: Noreen Yamane, Chancellor of HCC, who arrived shortly after photo was taken)
This picture illustrates the collaborative style that tells the community this is about all of us. UH Hilo and Hawaii Community College are being treated as part of the whole University of Hawai‘i system. Students are moving seamlessly from HCC to UHH and UH Manoa. Comments from the audience reinforced what was being said in the front of the room.

I came away with a really good feeling. The things taking place on the ground that affect our community are moving in the right direction.

Peak Oil in the Rear View Mirror; Geothermal in the Headlights

Last week Wally Ishibashi and I gave a presentation to the Hawaii County Council. There’s a video of our talk up now on local channel 52, where it will repeat from time to time.

Wally spoke about the Geothermal Working Group Report we gave to the legislature. I talked about “Peak Oil in the Rear View Mirror,” from the perspective of having been the only person from Hawai‘i to attend four Peak Oil conferences.

On Monday, I gave an essay presentation to the Social Science Association of Hawai‘i, whose members are prominent members of our community. This organization has been in operation since the 1800s.

From Kamehameha School Archives, 1886 January 21 -1892. Bishop becomes a member of the Social Science Association of Honolulu. All Bishop Estate Trustees and the first principal of Kamehameha Schools, William B. Oleson, are members. Members meet monthly to discuss topics concerning the well-being of society.

And yesterday I gave a “Peak Oil in the Rear View Mirror” presentation to the Office of Hawaiian Affairs’ Beneficiary Advocacy and Empowerment (BAE) Committee.

I was interested to note that the Hawaii County Council, the Social Science Association of Hawaii and OHA’s BAE committee were all overwhelmingly in favor of stabilizing electricity rates. It was clear to everyone that we in Hawai‘i are extremely vulnerable, and also so lucky to have a game-changing alternative.

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Hawaii is the world’s most remote population in excess of 500,000 people. Almost everybody and everything that comes to Hawaii comes via ship or airplane using oil as fuel. As isolated as we are, we are vulnerable to the changing nature of oil supply and demand. There is trouble in paradise.

I explained how it was that a banana farmer came to be standing in front of them giving a presentation about energy.

My story started way back when I was 10 years old. I remember Pop talking about impossible situations, and suddenly he would pound the dinner table with his fist, the dishes would bounce, and he would point in the air. “Not no can, CAN!” And at other times: “Get thousand reasons why no can, I only looking for the one reason why can.” He would say, “For every problem, find three solutions …. And then find one more just in case.”

Once he said, “Earthquake coming. You can hear it and see the trees whipping back and forth and see the ground rippling.” He gave a hint: “If you are in the air you won’t fall down. What you going do?”

I said, “Jump in the air.” He said yes, and do a half turn. I asked why.

He said, “Because after a couple of jumps you see everything.”

Lots of lessons in what he told a 10-year-old kid. Nothing is impossible. Plan in advance.

I made my way through high school and applied to the University of Hawai‘i. But I came from small town Hilo, and there were too many places to go, people to see and beers to drink. I flunked out of school.

It was during the Vietnam era, and if you flunked out of school you were drafted. Making the best of the situation, I applied for Officers Candidate School and volunteered to go to Vietnam.

I found myself in the jungle with a hundred other soldiers. It was apparent that if we got in trouble, no one was close enough to help us. The unwritten rule we lived by was that “We all come back, or no one comes back.” I liked that idea and have kept it ever since.

I returned to Hawai‘i and reentered the UH. I wanted to go into business, so I majored in accounting in order to keep score.

Pop asked if I would come and run the family chicken farm. I did, and soon realized that there would be an opportunity growing bananas. Chiquita was growing the banana market and we felt that we could gain significant market share if we moved fast. But, having no money, we needed to be resourceful. So we traded chicken manure for banana keiki.

A little bit at a time we expanded, and after a bunch of transformations, we became the largest banana farm in the state. Then about 20 years ago we purchased 600 acres at Pepe‘ekeo and we got into hydroponic tomato farming.

Approximately seven years ago, we noticed that our farm input costs were rising steadily, and I found out that it was related to rising oil prices. So in 2007, I went to the Association for the Study of Peak Oil (ASPO) conference to learn about oil. What I learned at that first ASPO conference was that the world had been using more oil than it was finding, and that it had been going on for a while.

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In addition to using more than we were finding, it was also apparent that the natural decline rate of the world’s cumulative oil fields needed to be accounted for. The International Energy Association (IEA) estimates that this decline rate is around 5 percent annually. This amounts to a natural decline of 4 million gallons per year. We will need to find the equivalent of a Saudi Arabia every two and a half years. Clearly we are not doing that, and will never do that.

At the second ASPO conference I attended, in Denver in 2009, I learned that the concept of Energy Return on Investment (EROI) was becoming more and more relevant. It takes energy to get energy, and the net energy that results is what is available for society to use. In the 1930s, getting 100 barrels of oil out of the ground took the energy in one of those barrels. In 1970, it was 30 to 1 and now it is close to 10-1.

Tar sands is approximately 4 to 1, while some biofuels are a little more than 1 to 1. And, frequently, fossil fuel is used to make biofuels. That causes the break-even point to “recede into the horizon.”

But the EROI for geothermal appears to be around 10 to 1. And its cost won’t rise for 500,000 to a million years.

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After the oil shocks of the early 1970s, the cost of oil per barrel was around the mid-$20 per barrel. That lasted for nearly 30 years.

In this graph above, one can see that oil would have cost around $35 per barrel in 2011, had inflation been the only influencer of oil price.

The cost of oil spiked in 2008, contributing to or causing the worst recession in history. In fact the last 10 recessions were related to spiking oil prices.

From late 2008 until mid-2009, the price of oil dropped as demand collapsed for a short time. But demand picked back up and the price of oil has climbed back to $100 per barrel – in a recession.

It is important to note that we in the U.S. use 26 barrels of oil per person per year, while in China each person uses only two barrels per person per year. Whereas we go into a recession when oil costs more than $100 per barrel, China keeps on growing. This is a zero sum game as we move per capita oil usage toward each other.

What might the consequences be as China and the U.S. meet toward the middle at 13 barrels of oil per person?

People are having a tough time right now due to rising energy-related costs. Two thirds of the economy is made up of consumer spending. If the consumer does not have money, he/she cannot spend.

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How will we keep the lights on and avoid flickering lights? Eighty percent of electricity needs to be firm, steady power. The other 20 percent can be unsteady and intermittent, like wind and solar. So the largest amount of electricity produced needs to have firm power characteristics.

There are four main alternatives being discussed today.

  1. Oil is worrisome because oil prices will likely keep on rising.
  2. Biofuels is expensive and largely an unproven technology. The EPA changed its estimation of cellulosic biofuel in 2011 from 250 million gallons to just 6.5 million gallons because cellulosic biofuels were not ready for commercial production.
  3. Biomass or firewood is a proven technology. Burn firewood, boil water, make steam, turn a generator – that’s a proven technology. It is limited because you cannot keep on burning the trees; they must be replenished. And it’s not clear where that equilibrium point is. There are also other environmental issues.
  4. That leaves geothermal.

The chain of islands that have drifted over the Pacific hotspot extends all the way up to Alaska. This has been going on for over 85 million years.

It’s estimated that the Big Island, which is over the hot spot now, will be sitting atop that hot spot for 500,000 to a million more years.

Of all the various base power solutions, geothermal is most affordable. Right now it costs around 10 cents per Kilowatt hour to produce electricity using geothermal, while oil at $100 per barrel costs twice as much. The cost of geothermal-produced electricity will stay steady. Allowing for inflation, geothermal generated electricity will stay stable for 500,000 to a million years, while oil price will rise to unprecedented heights in the near future.

Geothermal is proven technology. The first plant in Italy is 100 years old. Iceland uses cheap hydro and geothermal. It uses cheap electricity to convert bauxite to aluminum and sells it competitively on the world market. With the resulting hard currency, it buys the food that it cannot grow.

Iceland is more energy- and food-secure than we are in Hawai‘i. Ormoc City in the Philippines, which has a population similar to the Big Island, produces 700MW of electricity with its geothermal resource, compared to our 30 MW. Ormoc City shares the excess with other islands in the Philippines.

Geothermal is environmentally benign. It is a closed loop system and has a small footprint. A 30 MW geothermal plant sits on maybe 100 acres, while a similarly sized biomass project might take up 10,000 acres.

In addition, geothermal can produce cheap H2 hydrogen when people are sleeping. It is done by running an electric current through water releasing hydrogen and oxygen gas. One can make NH3 ammonia by taking the hydrogen and combining it with nitrogen in the air. That ammonia can be used for agriculture. NH3 ammonia is a better carrier of hydrogen that H2 hydrogen.

The extra H atom makes NH3 one third more energy-dense than H2 hydrogen. It can be shipped at ambient temperature in the propane infrastructure.

The use of geothermal can put future generations in a position to win when the use of hydrogen becomes more mature.

If we use geothermal for most of our base power requirements for electric generation, as oil prices rise we will become more competitive to the rest of the world. And our standard of living will rise relative to the rest of the world.

Then, because two thirds of GDP is made up of consumer spending, our people will have jobs and we will not have to export our most precious of all our resources – our children.

In addition, people will have discretionary income and will be able to support local farmers, and that will help us ensure food security.

Richard Wins Distinguished Alumni Award

Richard was honored recently as a 2011 Distinguished Alumni of the University of Hawai‘i.

“This award was less about me and really about all of us,” he told me. “I was pleased to be able to acknowledge June’s contributions, as well as my family’s – especially Mom and Pop.”

He was happy, too, that he had a chance to talk about the “common sense” value of using geothermal energy here in Hawai‘i.

He said it was hard to follow Chef Alan Wong and Dr. Henry Yang. “They are both very, very special individuals,” he said.

“Something like this award was beyond my wildest imagination when I flunked out of UH the first time around,” he said. “It just goes to show: Not ‘no can.’ ‘CAN!’”

Hydrogen-Powered Big Island Buses

The University of Hawai‘i’s Hawai‘i Natural Energy Institute (HNEI) is working on a very interesting project. They are going to use geothermal electricity to generate hydrogen to power two County of Hawai‘i buses.

Because the hydrogen will be stored in cylinders, the process can be turned off and on as necessary to help the electric utility stabilize the grid.

The biggest obstacle to using hydrogen as a transportation fuel is cost. Most of the time, hydrogen is extracted from fossil fuels, whose price will keep on rising.  But hydrogen can also be obtained by electrolysis – running an electric current through water – at the geothermal plant, where costs are low and stable.

The beginnings of this project date back several years to when we did the E Malama ‘Aina sustainability festival. That’s when and where I met Guy Toyama, who had a demonstration hydrolysis project that used electricity generated from a stream in Hakalau.

Guy has a company that does hydrogen projects. He speaks Japanese and he goes all over the world looking for processes that will make Hawai‘i attractive as a place to do hydrogen demonstration projects. He wants to attract major car companies to do their field testing on the Big Island. If you start seeing hydrogen fueling stations pop up on the Big Island, it will likely be because of him.

At the sustainability festival, Kimo Pa, our Hamakua Springs farm manager, and I saw the hydrogen bubbling up from water that had electricity passing through it. I introduced Guy to the folks in Iowa who were exploring making NH3 (ammonia) for fertilizer and for transportation.

That evolved into asking Rick Rocheleau, head of the HNEI, how we could make hydrogen or NH3 from geothermal energy to use for transportation and fertilizer. Rick got interested and allowed this direction to develop. Mitch Ewan, who is in charge of hydrogen projects at HNEI, is the one who conceived this current project.

The following press release announces that HNEI will soon issue a request for proposals to do this project. None of this would have been possible had it not been for the active support of the folks at Puna Geothermal Venture (PGV), Mike Kaleikini, PGV’s plant manager in particular.

Here is the press release:

Honolulu, HI – The Research Corporation of the University of Hawaii (“RCUH”), on behalf of the University of Hawaii’s Hawaii Natural Energy Institute (UH-HNEI) plans to issue a Request for Proposal (RFP) the week of January 4th 2011 for the supply of a “Turn-Key” hydrogen production and fueling system as a component of a Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) and US DOE project to demonstrate hydrogen energy systems as a potential grid management tool.   The objective of this project is to evaluate the feasibility of utilizing a hydrogen production and storage system to mitigate the impacts of renewable energy generation intermittency on the Big Island electrical grid. A unique element of the overall program is the demonstration of an electrolyzer as a controllable variable load that can provide grid services such as:

·        Up regulation;

·        Down regulation; and

·        Off-peak load (relieving curtailment of as-available renewable energy).

As background, regulation is responsible for maintaining the frequency of the grid at 60 Hz.  This is accomplished by using a real-time communication signal directly controlled by the grid operator.  The regulation control signal can call for either a positive “Up regulation” or negative “Down regulation” correction.  If load exceeds generation, frequency and voltage drop, and the grid operator relays a signal to generators requesting “Up regulation.”  When generation exceeds load and frequency increases, the grid operator requests “Down Regulation” and asks generators to reduce generation.

In this mode, the electrolyzer would be operated at a production rate that would be determined by the demand for a combination of transportation fuels, auxiliary power, and chemical feedstock production.  The electrolyzer would have the ability to reduce its load (i.e. ramp down) in response to a loss of renewable generation on the system.  This capability to quickly drop load is equivalent to “up-regulation” carried by generating units on the system.  The hydrogen energy system could also provide a quick transient increase in load (i.e. ramp up) that would be useful in loss-of-load events, such as a loss of transmission lines.  For this service, the difference between the maximum capacity of the electrolyzer and the steady state defines the ability of the electrolyzer to provide down regulation.  Hydrogen produced from the system could be used for a variety of value-added products, including use as a transportation fuel for two Ford E-450 shuttle buses operated by the County of Hawaii Mass Transportation Agency.  Optimized use of the electrolyzer and high value products are intended to increase the use of renewable energy resources, and reduce barriers to the introduction of further hydrogen infrastructure in Hawaii.

The RFP is intended to promote open and transparent competition among parties able to design, fabricate, and install the system at a geothermal plant on the Big Island of Hawaii.  A key design driver is the ability for remote monitoring and control of the system over the Internet.  This RFP will be technology neutral and any type of electrolyzer i.e Alkaline or Solid Polymer Electrolyte may be proposed.  Proposers may include teams comprised of systems integrators and electrolyzer manufacturers.  A primary focus of this program is rapid delivery and installation of equipment with a target operational readiness date of August 30th, 2011.  When released, the RFP and accompanying information will be published at http://www.hnei.hawaii.edu.  Any prospective offeror desiring an explanation or interpretation of the RFP must request it in writing (emailed to: Mitch Ewan at ewan@hawaii.edu) no later than January 31st, 2011 with the subject line “RFP for Turn-Key Hydrogen System.”  It is planned to conduct a bidders meeting and / or webinar in Washington DC on January 18th, 2011.  Proposals must be received by RCUH no later than 4:00 PM HST, February 15th, 2011.

Video: Climbing Up The Bamboo Pole

Richard Ha writes:

Awhile back I spoke to the UH Hilo Student Association Senate leaders about geothermal energy. I warned them that exponential growth fueled by a finite resource – oil – was a serious problem for us here on the Big Island.

Along the very same lines, Lloyds of London just warned its business clients to prepare or it could be catastrophic. I wrote about Lloyds of London's warning here.

I told the student leaders that we need to know what we are going to do before a catastrophe happens. "White water coming, we need to climb up the bamboo pole and lift up our legs." 

This video sums up everything I talk about on this blog.

Richard Ha Video