2020-08-26 Meeting Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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Commissioner Fulton said these were very exciting opportunities, and she asked who would address the mechanics of getting them in motion. Mr. Saito said the statute involved with third-party financing is Hawaiʻi Revised Statutes 36-41. The State Procurement Office had an RFP last year for vendors to bid on a master agreement, utilizing that statute, and the county is allowed to sign up to utilize that RFP process. He has been working with Director Kucharski on the scope of work, and he explained some of the steps involved. Commissioner Fulton wanted clarification on “where the gears start to move” and asked about the Doppler technology Mr. Holmes spoke about. Mr. Holmes said Doppler flow meters are being used by the Department of Water Supply, which has an energy specialist on their staff. In sewer collection systems, the Doppler meters could identify the areas where repairs are needed so the collection system can be triaged and the salt water kept out, as it is the salt that is preventing recycling the water. Commissioner Cardwell asked how the commission could support this process and help move it forward. Mr. Holmes said the commission is advisory, and the decision-makers are the administration. The commission could pass a motion in favor of moving forward on an ESPC contract and indicate their support by notifying the County Council and Mayor’s Office. Commissioner Adams said the scope of work is a large hurdle. The commission would want to leverage everything they can to deal with the zero waste goal. She is not sure they have the wherewithal to come up with a big plan on how to get less costly yet efficient waste management and also achieve the goal of eliminating pollution. Director Kucharski said the main issue they’re having is the ability to go into third-party financing. ESPC contracts generally need to be tied to energy. The power footprint of the Kealakehe WWTP has been reduced by about 40% with the last upgrade of new blowers. However, they have been working with Research and Development. Regarding methane from landfills, Hilo has never generated enough to meet EPA minimums for reuse of generated methane. However, the landfill at Puʻuanahulu does generate methane, and they have been working with Waste Management on collecting it. He would welcome working with Research and Development on a project to provide the gas to generate hydrogen. Regarding the Doppler system, it is his understanding that it is used on pressure systems. However, the majority of the wastewater lines are gravity, so he is not sure the Doppler system would work with them. Steven Holmes: Let me add a few things. In response to Commissioner Adams, the idea—Bill’s been struggling trying to find a third-party way to address water recycling. So right now they’re throwing their resource away into a hole in the ground and we’ve got pollution issues, as the commissioner pointed out. So how do we stop that? One thing we need to do is to prevent salt water from coming into the collection system that makes it impossible to do water recycling. The second thing, then, is to find another way to finance water recycling. And because water recycling finances itself based on the income that it generates, how do you park that. How do you make it happen within this public-private partnership realm without getting 7