Kauai advancing on energy: Ethanol production, electricity from biomass may keep sugar growing

Oct 16, 2009 (The Honolulu Advertiser - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- PAWEF | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating -- LIHU'E, Kaua'i -- Pacific West Energy's proposed biomass-to-electricity plant on Kaua'i would help reduce Hawai'i's reliance on foreign oil while keeping sugar cane cultivation alive on the Garden Isle, project observers say.

Meanwhile, the company's planned 15 million-gallons-a-year sugar ethanol plant is on track to be the first in-state supplier of the gasoline additive.

And that's not even factoring in Pacific West's intention to produce sugar for food and rum-making on Kaua'i, or a potential demonstration project for making ethanol directly from woody plants.

"I think there's a tremendous amount of goodness in there for Kaua'i and the state," Ted Peck, energy administrator for the state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism, said of PacWest's ongoing work to bring its $135 million plan to fruition.

Kaua'i Island Utility Co-operative announced Wednesday that it will buy power from PacWest's 20-megawatt power plant, fired with sugar cane and woody biomass.

"I've always supported PacWest because the numbers work for this project," said state Rep. Mina Morita, D-14th (Kapa'a, Hanalei).

"The economics for sugar cane as a biomass crop are sound," said Morita, chairwoman of the House Committee on Energy and Environmental Protection and a long-time proponent of renewable energy.

"I think where people get mixed up is looking at the energy return on corn ethanol. For sugar, it's something like for every unit of energy put into the crop, you get out eight (units of energy). Where corn is like one to one," Morita said.

All of the 40 million gallons per year of ethanol that is blended with Hawai'i gasoline is now imported, and no other proposed ethanol plant is under construction in Hawai'i, said Maria Tome, of the state Energy Office.

KIUC's promise that it will buy energy produced by the plant bolsters PacWest's efforts to round up investors, Morita said.

"This is a project we can do right now because the technology is solid," Morita said. "We know how to grow sugar cane on Kaua'i, and we have the resources. ... It's an opportunity that we shouldn't forgo."

Gay & Robinson, Kaua'i's last active sugar plantation, expects to finish harvesting its last crop of cane within two weeks.

If the more than 200 Gay & Robinson workers are hired by PacWest as projected, they will be people working on Kaua'i who otherwise would be unemployed, Morita said.

The power plant would help KIUC reach its goal of generating half its electricity with renewable sources by 2023, KIUC president Randy Hee said.

Burning sugar cane and woody plants to generate electricity is "not quite carbon neutral, but pretty close," the state's Peck said. "It's certainly better than a fossil fuel plant" -- which is what KIUC had planned for its next power plant.

"This is money staying on island," Peck said. "The community unquestionably is going to benefit."

Though the PacWest project may work out for Kaua'i, a U.S. Department of Agriculture rural energy specialist on Hilo doesn't see sugar returning to its dominance in Hawai'i agriculture.

"Hawai'i is about 15 years too late for capturing the ethanol market," said Timothy W. O'Connell. "The sugar industry is gone," much of its infrastructure disassembled, and Hawai'i farmers are concentrating on high-value, niche-market crops on small parcels, he said.

Tome said she believes some sugar cane -- especially with dual use as food crop and biomass -- can survive as part of Hawai'i's agriculture mix. The woody tree leucaena, which is proposed as an additional biomass crop, has been studied by the University of Hawai'i, she said.

PacWest plans to harvest sugar cane still green in the field with combines that will chop it into 18-inch lengths, Maloney said.

Cane will not be burned in the field and the roots will be left to grow a new crop, he said.

Reach Diana Leone at dleone@honoluluadvertiser.com.

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