Venture to make state clean energy example

By HARRY EAGAR, Staff Writer
KAHULUI — With a defense contract in hand, Hawai‘i BioEnergy LLC, in which Maui Land & Pineapple Co. is a founding partner, is ready “to move from R (research) to D development),” says ML&P Chief Operating Officer Robert “Rob” Webber.

A marker of progress since the alliance was formed in 2006 was the appointment last week of an executive vice president, Joel Matsunaga.

Hawai‘i BioEnergy is a venture of three large landowners, Maui Land & Pineapple Co., Kamehameha Schools and Grove Farm, who came together to identify and develop new sources of renewable energy.

Other consortium partners include Finistere Ventures, a life sciences venture capital firm based in San Diego; Khosla Ventures of Menlo Park, Calif., which offers venture assistance, strategic advice and capital to entrepreneurs; and Ohana Holdings LLC, an investment firm based in Hanalei, Kauai.

The venture has been exploring several avenues on alternative energy, looking for ways that would maximize its land assets, such as by developing ethanol from sugar cane.

The Defense Advanced Projects Agency exploration contract is more unusual — trying to make military jet fuel (JP-8) from algae.

DARPA asked for a proposal focused on Hawaii because the Department of Defense buys a lot of fossil jet fuel in the islands.

It recently made a phase one grant to support two projects proposed by a partnership between SAIC (Science Applications International Corp.) and General Atomics to process JP-8 from oil-rich crops produced by agriculture or aquaculture.

ML&P Chairman David Cole, who is also chairman of Hawai‘i BioEnergy, said (at the kickoff meeting in Honolulu of the Hawaii Bio-energy Master Plan) that “by nature’s design our island archipelago is the most remote on earth. Yet, at the same time we are endowed with the ingredients to become the world’s leading example of efficient, clean and green energy.”

The DARPA-funded research is expected to last three years. “This is in fairly early stages,” says Webber. The funding is significant, but the amount was not disclosed.

Wind, solar and water power are also on the menu.

In a sense, “it’s back to the future” for the company, says Webber. Plantations used to produce all their own energy, and most of the sources were local and renewable: bagasse or, on Maui Pineapple Co.’s part, hydroelectric.

Teri Freitas-Gorman, ML&P’s vice president for corporate communications, says the old plantation way was “truly sustainable.”

Webber says the intention is not just to prove concepts but to develop businesses.

“It cannot be sustainable without profitability . . . For us to continue for the next hundred years, we need a profitable operation.”

Matsunaga, a graduate of the University of Hawaii and a certified public accountant, was previously vice president of external affairs at Hawaiian Telcom, where he had worked since 1979. At that time, the company was GTE Hawaiian Telephone Co.

“We are delighted to have an executive of Joel’s caliber join the Hawai‘i BioEnergy family,” said Cole. “His extensive experience in public affairs, community relations, marketing, revenues and earnings, network operations and regulatory organizations will bring the required expertise to our company as we begin our transition from research to operations. “



• Harry Eagar can be reached at heagar@mauinews.com.