Mana Plain News Today

Community Groups Nā Ki‘ai Kai and Surfrider Foundation represented by Earthjustice, The County of Kauai, and the Department of Health reached a settlement agreement that could resolve health and environmental

Kauai’s nonprofit electric utility recently announced that part of its West Kauai Energy Project with developer and operator AES Corp. has been canceled, and that it is uncertain whether the remainder of the overall $250 million project remains financially feasible.

LIHUE, Hawaii — It’s hard to find anywhere in the United States that has greened its electricity supply as quickly as verdant Kauai. And the people of Kauai achieved that on their own, through collective ownership of the electricity grid, not by hoping profit-maximizing utilities find a way to balance the urgency of human-caused climate change with quarterly dividends for shareholders.

A proposed hydro project — the first of its kind in the world — could supply up to a quarter of the island’s power by diverting 4 billion gallons a year from the Waimea River.

For the past four years, the Kauai Island Utility Cooperative (KIUC) has been finalizing a 3,600 page environmental assessment of its West Kauai Energy Project (WKEP).