WIND, WAVES, WIRES AND CONTROVERSY

A key provision of new legislation introduced by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev) will resolve controversy and open the way for a national New Energy transmission superhighway.

The Clean Renewable Energy and Economic Development Act of 2009 allows the President to designate areas of high New Energy value, called "Renewable Energy Zones," in which the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) will have the authority to step into disputes at state and local levels and push new wire routing along.

Presently, legal jurisdiction goes to the state regulatory agency. That jurisdiction was recently reaffirmed in the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals’ Piedmont Environmental Council v. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission conclusion.

According to the Piedmont Environmental Council: “The Court's decision overturns FERC's hard-charging, environment-be-damned approach to fast-tracking transmission line siting throughout the northeast and southwest corridors…”

Senator Reid’s legislation is a 40-page package of funding and policy measures, all of which will be significant contributions to the building of an urgently needed new transmission system. (See NEW ENERGY WIRES, THE PLAN and NEW ENERGY WIRES FOR OBAMA GOALS) It is unlikely any of the bill’s provisions, however, will do more to make it possible to reach the goal than the one that streamlines the controversial regulatory process.

To get this built, some powerful siting needs to get done. (click to enlarge)

In paradise – also known as the Hawiian Islands – an utterly unique and cutting-edge New Energy concept has come up hard against squabbling over jurisdictions and controversies over who has the right to approve a project and who has the right to refuse it.

Grays Harbor Ocean Energy Co. is developing unproven technology that will harvest wind and wave energies in the same location. It wants to build an installation between O'ahu and Moloka'i that could potentially be a significant contribution toward meeting O'ahu’s electricity needs.

Paradise is already generating electricity with wind onshore. (click to enlarge)

First, however, the project must make its way through the regulatory maze.

Grays Harbor is awaiting a response from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) on a preliminary permit for the project and 6 others on the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. (See WAVE + WIND = $28 BIL & 7,700 MW, THE BIGGEST NEW ENERGY EVER)

The application to FERC is only for the wave energy part of the project and would only grant rights for 3 years of further feasibility studies. Construction could only come if FERC grants a subsequent 5-year license for a small-scale pilot project. The commercial installation could finally come if the pilot project performs without problems.

For the wind energy part of the installation, Grays Harbor must obtain a separate permission from the Minerals Management Service (MMS) of the U.S. Department of Interior (DOI) because MMS claims jurisdiction over wind projects in federal waters. (It also disputes FERC's jurisdiction over the wave project.)

The wind turbines are expected to produce 90% of the power from the installation. Without them, the installation would not be economically viable. Grays Harbor will, therefore, go on dealing with FERC and MMS.

There are a variety of offshore technologies. (click to enlarge)

If Grays harbor manages to get FERC and MMS settled down, it will have the opportunity to confront the next part of the regulatory maze. The stretch of water where Grays Harbor wants to put its installation is Penguin Bank, the heart of the Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary.

Penguin Bank, the eroded summit of an undersea volcano, is relatively shallow and close to shore. Ideal for food foraging, it attracts calving, mating and calf-rearing whales as well as monk seals, another endangered species.

Grays Harbor says the Penguin Bank area is the only one that meets criteria necessary for a high-production wave-wind installation. It is large, relatively shallow, near shore and near the population center on O’ahu where there is a big electricity demand.

Burton Hamner, President, Grays Harbor: "If I didn't have to be in a sanctuary, I wouldn't be there…"

The locals are not happy.

Irene Bowie, executive director, Maui Tomorrow: "Great project, wrong location…"

Residents are more blunt.

Halona Kaopuiki, Moloka'i resident and owner, 4th generation family fishery: "It's going to be a big, big problem…We're really against this."

Grays Harbor says they have done the proper environmental studies, have experience in other locations and are sure the installation will not interfere with marine life.

Burton Hamner, President, Grays Harbor: "Once these things are installed, they're just a bunch of sticks in the water…"

The National Marine Fisheries Service isn’t so sure. Its filing with FERC says project noise could drive the whales and monk seals from the area.

If Grays Harbor gets its project past the federal and environmental regulators, it must still deal with other local issues. Hawaiian Electric Co (HECO), the local utility powerbroker, is not enthusiastic.

Hamner, Grays Harbor: "The greatest risk to this project ever happening is that Honolulu doesn't need the power…"

Exemplary of HECO’s lack of enthusiasm for the project was its spokesman’s ambivalent statement.

Darren Pai, spokesman, HECO: "We're always willing to listen to renewable energy developers…"

The local community is also not enthusiastic. There is a concern about compromise of the uniquely magnificent aesthetics of paradise.

Though Grays Harbor has picked a section of the water between Moloka'i and O'ahu allowing it to put no turbines closer than 10 miles from either, the unprecedently huge 10-megawatt turbines may still be just barely visible – the size of a fingernail at arm’s length – from shore.

Unfortunately, locals did not find out about this visibility factor until after Grays Harbor filed for its preliminary permit.

Steve Morgan, resident, Moloka'i: "It already creates bad blood right from the start…It always makes us angry when we find out about these things second hand."

Hamner plans to begin meeting with island residents and dealing with them as "stakeholders" in the hope of winning them over.

As with most New Energy breakthroughs almost everywhere, Hawaii's governmental decision-makers have doubts about whether an unproven form of power generation - and a daunting engineering undertaking as well - is worth fighting over with environmentalists, NIMBYs, federal regulators and the local utility.

Josh Strickler, facilitator of New Energy projects, Hawaii Department of Business, Economic Development & Tourism: "We would love to see this project come to fruition…There's just some concerns about the technical viability."

The Grays Harbor concept of combining wind turbines with wave energy generators is a brilliant and obvious synergy but it has never been proven. To make things even more challenging, Grays Harbor proposes to incorporate not 1 but 2 breakthrough technologies. Both its wind and wave machines are cutting-edge. The world’s only commercial scale wave energy installation (in Portugal) uses a completely different type of generator. No offshore wind installation is presently generating comparable power or operating the gargantuan 10-megawatt turbines Grays Harbor is planning to use.

The Grays Harbor wave energy Oscillating Water Column generator. (click to enlarge)

On the bright side, by the time this project makes it through the regulatory process, these technologies will likely be proven and could be, by then, perceived as old-fashioned and user-friendly.

The last time FERC granted a permit for an offshore installation the project never got built. There is no information on whether the original permit applicant outlived the approval process.

The Grays Harbor platform. (click to enlarge)

The cleverest thing about the Grays Harbor technology, without a doubt, is that the individual wave-and-wind power platforms are designed so they can be moved if regulators, environmentalists or activists object to where they are initially located.

Although moving a platform might start the entire interminable process all over again...

Paradise is already generating electricity with wind onshore. (click to enlarge)

Legislation pushes Obama's vision of 'green' power lines
Larry Greenemeier, March 6, 2009 (Scientific American)
and
Wind, wave energy platforms proposed in Hawaii whale waters; Project would operate 100 platforms within humpback whale habitat
Rob Perez, March 8, 2009 (Honolulu Advertiser)

WHO
Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC); Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.); Grays Harbor Ocean Energy Co. (Burton Hamner, President);Irene Bowie, executive director, Maui Tomorrow; Office of National Marine Sanctuaries; U.S. Minerals Management Service (MMS) of the U.S. Department of Interior (DOI); Hawaiian Electric Co (HECO); National Marine Fisheries Service; Life of the Land (Henry Curtis, executive director)

WHAT
Senator Reid’s Clean Renewable Energy and Economic Development Act of 2009 would build a national high volatage New Energy transmission superhighway. Grays Harbor wants to build a combined wind and wave energy installation off O’ahu. Both deal with the jurisdiction of FERC and its ability to dictate policy to the affected state.

click to enlarge

WHEN
- Reid introduced his bill March 5.
- Grays Harbor has federal applications pending.
- Grays Harbor does not anticipate applying for a Hawaii license before 2012 and does not anticpate completing the process before 2016.
- Grays Harbor was formed in 2007.

Grays Harbor plans to use the biggest turbines never built. (click to enlarge)

WHERE
- Renewable Energy Zones, 1: The building of new transmission is expected to be of particular benefit to undeveloped sections of the Southwest (like Senator Reid’s home state of Nevada) rich in solar power plant-adequate sun but without adequate high voltage transmission to deliver the power produced to high-demand population centers.
- Renewable Energy Zones, 2: Other areas expected to profit from new transmission are (1) The wind-rich Midwest, Pacific Northwest, Great Lakes region and offshore Mid-Atlantic; (2) The geothermal-rich western states; (3) The wave-rich Pacific coast and the Gulf-current endowed Florida coast.
- Penguin Bank is in the heart of the Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary between O'ahu and Moloka'I.
- Grays Harbor wants to develop an 80-square-mile area.

Norway's Statoil - masters of the offshore world - are experimenting with a floating turbine. (click to enlarge)

WHY
- The $787 billion stimulus package includes up to $30 billion for grid upgrade and smart grid technology.
- Hawaii’s highest building is the First Hawaiian Tower, is 435 feet tall. The 10-megawatt turbines proposed would, combining tower and blade span, be taller.
- Grays Harbor wants to put in ~100 raised off-shore platforms to harvest up to 1,100 megawatts of electricity from waves and wind.
- The estimated cost of all 7 of Gray's Harbor's wind-and-wave projects is ~$28 billion(i.e., $4 billion each).
- The Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary is considered one of the most important whale habitats in the world.
- The Office of National Marine Sanctuaries is trying to get the Grays Harbour project moved.
- Grays Harbor says the wind-wave installation will not have any significant environmental impact because the submerged parts do not move and burying the transmission lines will only be a temporary disruption.
- Off-shore energy installations elsewhere have reportedly not been found environmentally harmful.
- Grays Harbor’s platforms will each have 3 concrete-encased steel pipe legs into the ocean floor and rise 50 feet above the ocean surface to hold the wave and wind turbines.
- Environmental group Life of Land, which favors the concept of wave energy, awaits final designation of the Grays Harbor installation’s location before approving the project.

Schematic of the Grays Harbor wave energy Oscillating Water Column generator. (click to enlarge)

QUOTES
- Senator Reid: "Nevada and other parts of the desert southwest have enough solar energy potential to power our country seven times over…"
- Hammer: "This is a technology that does work."