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Being an archipelago, powering Hawaii's energy grid is a notable economic and technological challenge. As local resources and infrastructures for electricity production are limited, the state consumes nearly 7x more energy that it produces (EIA 2023). Much of Hawaii's power plants are powered by different forms of imported petroleum (including 76.4 Btu of jet fuel! (EIA 2023)), which makes up about 4/5 of the state's energy resource mix (EIA 2023). While they are comparatively easy to ship, these fuels are also much more expensive than other fossil fuels (such as natural gas or coal), which power many of the grids in the continental US. As a result, Hawaii has the highest retail price of electricity of any state in the US, at about 3x the national average price (EIA 2023). Another of Hawaii's energy disadvantages is that each island is run as a separate electricity grid, with no undersea electricity transmission cables. This means that, for grid security reasons, each separate island has to produce a surplus of energy (what's called an energy reserve margin target) to ensure grid reliability against unpredictable factors (such as a sudden operation failure of a power plant coinciding with an upswing in energy demand). For comparison, Hawaii Electric, which powers about 95% of the state's electricity (EIA 2023), set's its energy reserve margin at 30% (Hawaii Electric 2021), while most grids in the contiguous US shoot for a reserve margin of about 15%-20% (Energy Knowledge Base ND). 

That said, due in part to these stringent techno-economic challenges, Hawaii has also pushed quite strongly for the state's transition to renewable energy. Hawaii has set the date for 100% renewable energy to 2045, the earliest target date for this transition in the US. Oahu and Maui hit 34.5% renewable energy in 2021, surpassing the goal to hit 30% by 2020 (Oglesby 2021). A smaller electric coop reported that its energy mix achieved a whopping 60% renewables in 2020 (Oglesby 2021). Interestingly, rooftop solar (which is often seen as a less practical/less significant strategy for achieving renewable energy transition) made up the highest source of renewable energy (EIA 2023).

While these facts show promise for a cleaner and more sustainable and energy-independent energy system in Hawaii, these energy transition efforts have also posed new sociotechnical and ethical challenges of their own. Back n 2022,  the Hawaii State Senate passed a renewable energy bill that threatened to severely limit the state's ability to plan and implement a "just transition" to renewable energy. Rehashing many of the arguments against renewable energy in the contiguous US, the bill cited the "intermittency" of solar and wind power as a threat to grid security and thus proposed a policy that would require the state to produce at least 1/3 of its power from more "firm" renewable resources that can produce energy around the clock (i.e. hydroelectric dams, geothermal, and also biomass, renewable biodiesel, and renewable natural gas). While technically renewable, many of these so called "firm" sources continue to emit GHGs and other harmful pollutants that threaten the climate, ecosystems, and public health (Kane 2022). Others, like the hydro electric project in Kauai, continue to threaten the fishing and agricultural operations that many residents rely on for their own staples or for growing cash crops to produce their income (Lyte 2023). Using plantation-era ditch systems, Kauai's hydro project planned to divert an estimated 4 billion gallons of water from the Waimea River watershed, which would all but dry up the river's numerous braided streams upon which many residents depend. As Brittany Lyte notes in her article covering the issue (2023), this plantation-era practice reproduces the cultural and ecological destruction native Hawaiians have been facing and fighting against for over a century.

While activists continue to struggle to ensure that the Kauai hydro project will be ecologically and socially just, to the relief of many environmental and renewable energy advocates, the Hawaii Governor vetoed the aforementioned renewable energy bill in July of 2022. That said, the very fact that this bill passed the state senate illustrates the potential for "renewable energy" transitions to reproduce many of the same social, economic, and even climate and environmental justice issues and challenges that these transitions are (at least superficially) intended to mitigate or resolve.

Sources:

• includes severe water pollution -- tied to militarism, including raw sewage and petroleum contamination (incl. in Oahu's sole aquifer) - O'ahu Water Protectors, calls to shut down the Navy's Red Hill facility
• (combo disaster) potential radioactive contamination and legacies of U.S. nuclear weapon testing -- "The Runit Dome is a relic of America’s atomic past. It’s home to 3 million cubic feet of radioactive waste that was buried there as part of the government’s effort to clean up the mess left from dozens of nuclear tests in the 1940s and ’50s that decimated the atoll. A warming climate and rising sea levels now threaten the integrity of the saucer-shaped structure, which, if it fails, could spill its radioactive contents into the Pacific, a scenario that would threaten both people and the surrounding environment." (source)
• wildfires, compounded by climate change

• settler colonialism - Haunani-Kay Trask's concept of "settlers of color" and "immigrant hegemony" (The Mauna Kea Syllabus), Kēhaulani Kauanui's article on enduring indigenity/asserting indigenity as a category of analysis
• military-industrial complex + Hawaii as a linchpin of U.S. military interests - Ke'awalau o Pu'uloa (Pearl Harbor) alone has six superfund sites (Cultural Survival)
• tourism - functioning hand in hand with militarism. From Vernadette Vicuña Gonzalez's book, Securing paradise : tourism and militarism in Hawai'i and the Philippines: "For instance, in both Hawai'i and the Philippines, U.S. military modes of mobility, control, and surveillance enable scenic tourist byways. Past and present U.S. military posts, such as the Clark and Subic Bases and the Pearl Harbor complex, have been reincarnated as destinations for tourists interested in World War II. The history of the U.S. military is foundational to tourist itineraries and imaginations in such sites. At the same time, U.S. military dominance is reinforced by the logics and practices of mobility and consumption underlying modern tourism. Working in tandem, militarism and tourism produce gendered structures of feeling and formations of knowledge. These become routinized into everyday life in Hawai'i and the Philippines, inculcating U.S. imperialism in the Pacific."
  

The University of Hawai'i has this incredible resource of resistance movements from 1960-2010. The section on  militarization, for example, includes resources on issues such as the environmental degradation of Kaho'olawe (used as a target range by the U.S. Navy), evictions in the Mākua Valley, and the construction of the H-3 Highway (and how tourism and militarism function together). 

It seems to me that our era is one of dispersion and disarticulation. This is not the same as the siloed domains of disciplinary society. These siloes are what has been undone. Cultural critique and also even transdisciplinarity have, I think, at times, been both symptomatic and catalyst of this wide-spread historical trend of dispersion. That doesn't mean we need to return to the siloes, it means we need to be smarter and more intentional in the way we coordinate our critiques and our collaborations.

It seems to me that what we need are new skills and expertise in what could be called "regrouping." This is a key dynamic of anthropology and ethnography since its very beginning. But it's even more apparent in contemporary, multi-sited/sighted ethnography: i.e. the intentionally constructed research designs inspired by Marcus's early work on the method.

I think we need theoretically informed coordinational capacities. Experimenting with new kinds of partnerships, organizational designs, production and flows of information.

The Community Air Protection Program Online Resource Center is "a one-stop shop to obtain data, guidance, and tools to support improving air quality at the community scale. The Resource Center serves as a centralized repository of information and resources for use by community members, air districts, and the public. It will be continuously updated as new documents, materials, and data become available."

See this recording and supporting documents for CARB's AB 617 Consultation Group Meeting on February 26, 2020.

"The AB 617 Consultation Group includes individuals representing environmental justice organizations, air districts, industry, academia, public health organizations, and local government. Consultation Group meetings provide an opportunity to discuss of various aspects of Community Air Protection Program implementation. Consultation Group meetings complement additional outreach and consultation efforts through a variety of forums including public workshops, community meetings, and discussions with individual organizations and stakeholders."