Solar power is beneficial for the environment. It doesn’t cause greenhouse gases to be released into the atmosphere, and no compounds become airborne that can harm humans, animals, and plants. When homeowners install solar systems, economic considerations such as return on investment come into play, as photovoltaic (PV) systems can generate more power than is used. Another economic factor that has gotten much attention is the price of real estate and, at least in California, it has been found that homes with PV systems have sold at higher prices than properties without them. This appreciation in value has significant implications on the real-estate market as home buyers and sellers consider the differences in pricing.

Various models are used to price homes. This can get a little technical, but basically hedonic pricing models assess value according what each characteristic of the home adds to the overall cost, while difference-in-difference modeling is used for homes sold for a second time with a different feature than was present during the first sale. (For example, a PV system that was installed in between the first sale and the second one.) Using these models, real estate experts found that prices were higher in California for homes with photovoltaic arrays installed. However, average price premiums for new homes with PV systems were lower than for existing houses. This could be because of variations in the cost of installing solar power in new construction and existing structures. However, home builders may also play on buyer motivation by including PV panels in the package at a lower premium.

In Hawaii, residents have a number of strong incentives for installing and utilizing solar power. They can hedge against a rise in electricity costs, and also take advantage of the return on investment such systems provide over time. An ordinance issued by the city of Honolulu, Hawaii bans adding the value of a solar system to the cost of the home. Also, properties cannot be re-assessed once they are fit with solar power, meaning your property taxes won’t go up from the solar installation and because the provision extends for 25 years, won’t go up due to normal appreciation either, a considerable savings. This, along with the offset in electricity costs, combined with inflation, can amount to a consistent monthly savings of hundreds or more for high-value properties. Combine this with the tax credits (both state and federal) for photovoltaic arrays and solar begins to seem like a real no-brainer.

Home owners still have return on investment to consider, but save even further on property taxes without the PV system added to the property value. Savings accrued by the long term investment value are still in play, but the additional savings go beyond this as well. This is a big bonus to home owners in Hawaii, since significant incentives for using solar power already exist. It is also a huge step toward being self-sufficient, as importing power has been a huge burden on the state’s economy. Now home owners can not only break even, they can see real profit by going solar.

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References:

• Berkeley Lab
• City and County of Honolulu

We live in one of the most beautiful places on earth. Our options for food here on the islands are exciting and delicious – fresh, organic, local, fulfilling, and varied by multinational culinary influence. We have ample access to renewable energy sources and recyclable materials, and know the importance of sustainability to our environment, our health, and our wallets.

So why do we continue to allow our local restaurants and eateries to serve us food in Styrofoam containers? It’s indisputably horrible for the environment, ultimately bad for us, and ugly to boot.

And still, day after day, restaurants ranging from island-wide chains to your neighborhood lunch wagon and your favorite Thai spot are almost all serving their delicious meals in these Earth-killing Styrofoam tray-boxes.

Enough is enough, and we don’t have to wait for the restaurants to agree.

What’s so bad about Styrofoam?

• It takes hundreds of years to biodegrade.
• Very few curbside or transfer station recycling programs accept styrofoam, so it goes into the trash. By volume, the amount of space used up in landfills by all plastics is between 25 and 30 percent 1.
• Polystyrene foam (the technical name for Styrofoam) is a major element of ocean debris and pollution. It is extremely toxic to marine life and a huge component of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.)
• Styrofoam that doesn’t make its way to a landfill or the ocean has an equally deleterious effect on animal life on land.
• It’s bad for our food, and bad for us! Toxic chemicals leach out of styrofoam and into the food it contains, especially in the microwave. These chemicals threaten human health and reproductive systems.
• The creation of polystyrene contributes to the destruction of the ozone layer. The National Bureau of Standards Center for Fire Research identified 57 chemical byproducts released during the combustion of polystyrene foam 2.
• Workers in polystyrene manufacturing are exposed to styrene (the building block of polystyrene), chronic exposure to which can cause a huge number of health problems 3.

What can we do about it?

We can stop buying it! And we can stop buying it right now.

Demand that the restaurants you visit use recyclable containers or don’t go to that restaurant. Follow up by encouraging the restaurant in person and on public forums like Yelp! to use recyclable packaging.

Eventually, we can outlaw it. Many cities in the US have outlawed polystyrene foam – Portland, Oregon and Orange County, California, just to name two West Coast examples, along with over a hundred others. Honolulu itself considered a ban three years ago but it went nowhere 4.

Why should restaurants in Hawaii use alternatives to Styrofoam?

Post-consumer recycled paper, bamboo, corn plastics, and a variety of other alternative materials are easily renewable and readily available. All of these products biodegrade when composted, and paper products can be recycled at most people’s doorstep where community recycling is in place. And it looks a lot better.

Now what?

Here’s the deal, Hawaii. Our blog has a large following, and we believe in supporting local business that share our values. In fact, we are happy to shamelessly promote them!

So if you know any restaurants in Hawaii that are environmentally conscious, socially responsible, and willing to do what’s right for their customers and their environment rather than what they perceive to be cheaper and easier, send us their name! We promise to follow up with our readers and let them know where to go for their next culinary experience, even if they are just in the mood for some good old loco moco 5.

We will keep an updated list on our blog, friend the restaurant on our Facebook page, and link to our list in our monthly email updates to customers and friends.

Let’s work together to find the right companies and vote with our wallets.

What’s Your Favorite No-Styrofoam Restaurant? Let Us Know!

In Hawaii, solar energy is plentiful; the sun that warms our islands provides an outstanding level of insolation and as many as 276 days a year of sunshine. Many homeowners would like to deploy solar power systems to cut or even eliminate their power bill, but the cost of installing a new solar system is significant. There’s a financial strategy known as “hedging” that makes the economic case for solar power even clearer. In effect, by investing in a solar system and effectively locking your energy cost rate, you limit or mitigate your financial exposure (and, thus, risk) of unpredictable high energy prices in the future. After all, we all know energy prices go up, not down. There is no reason to believe this will change in the near future.

Hedging is similar in concept to taking out insurance. For example, many people take out disability insurance so that if they aren’t able to work, the lost income will be covered. A “hedge” is essentially making a bet that pays off if something happens in the future. Specifically, if electricity prices continue to rise, as historically they have, a solar installation represents a source of electricity at a fixed cost. If you build a solar power station that will generate electricity at a cost of 25 cents per kilowatt hour, in the expectation that conventional electrical costs will rise past that point, you are hedging against a rise in power costs.

The reality of Hawaii’s electricity industry is that power costs are almost certain to rise going forward. Power companies are under pressure from high demand and by persistent turmoil in the Middle East. Most power on Hawaii is generated by oil turbines; when the Middle East catches a cold, Honolulu sneezes. The result is a rise in prices for electricity. This type of sector-specific inflation is not usually compensated for by increased wages and salaries, by the way – have you ever gotten a raise because your boss was concerned about how much you had to spend on ever-increasing gas prices? The trend line for fossil energy prices is very clear; the price of electricity produced by oil-fired turbines is not going to go down any time soon. (Electricity market prices are notoriously hard to summarize, but just as one example, in Maui, energy rates rose from 22.5 cents per kilowatt hour in 2005 to 36 cents in 2008.) Solar hedging allows homeowners to insure against this ever-increasing price trend by locking in electricity at an affordable rate that won’t go up. In fact, someone could argue that an array that produces more power than the home uses today, can become MORE profitable if fossil fuel prices rise, since the fixed-cost array will produce power that’s worth more and more as time goes on, and conceivably personal usage will rise as we add more electric devices to our collection of consumer goods. Clearly, purchasing a solar system today is a wise investment that typically returns 100% investment in just a few years.

Even if a homeowner is not in a position to buy a photovoltaic array, there are financing options that provide a way to take advantage of solar hedging. Solar leases allow homeowners to play the hedging game by having a third party bear the initial capital cost of the array installation. The homeowner in essence leases the array from the third party, with a locked-in rate for the electricity generated. The homeowner doesn’t own the array, but in effect they own the power that it produces. The capital cost is thus spread out over time, and even basic solar systems can generate electricity that is worth more than a typical monthly payment for a lease if power prices go high enough.

With a solar lease, the power cost is locked in over time, producing an ongoing savings in utility rates. In addition, since the lease is generally attached to a property rather than to a person, the solar lease can greatly augment the desirability (and market value) of the home or building. Purchasers will know that they are buying the right to fixed-cost power. Solar power for a home, whether purchased outright or leased from a third party, is thus a hedge against both higher power costs and a hedge in support of real estate values.

At the margin, solar energy is cheaper than almost any other form of power — the sun provides an unlimited source of energy, and, for home arrays, the power generation occurs at the same place it is consumed. However, that “at the margin” qualifier is a little misleading. Once you’ve built a power plant of any sort, whether it’s a 200-watt microsolar array or a 200 megawatt coal plant, the marginal cost of your power is the cost of your fuel plus the cost of operating the plant; once you’ve built a solar array, your marginal cost is pretty close to zero. Sunshine is free and solar panels don’t need much maintenance. But accountants and economists will tell you that marginal cost isn’t the only cost that matters. The fixed cost — that is, the amount it took to build and deploy the power plant in the first place — also has to be understood. That initial outlay needed to build and install a photovoltaic system deters many people from switching over to the most renewable form of energy available. However, the rising costs of electricity in Hawaii and the federal and state tax incentives available for solar power investors enable a positive return on investment (ROI) in just a few years.

To explain ROI, mathematical formulas and a barrage of tabulated numbers are usually presented. This is enough to make most people’s eyes roll back in their heads; hard evidence isn’t often recognized through a series of mind-boggling numbers. A simple formula for ROI is to take the gain from the investment and subtract the cost of purchasing, installing, and implementing the system. That number is then divided again by the total cost to determine the actual ROI.

The answer comes in the form of a percentage. If this number is positive, or above zero, that means the investment was a profitable one. Consider the purchase of an extremely energy-efficient air conditioning system. If the system costs $1,500 to install, but the electricity savings amount to $1,000 each year, then the rate of return over a five-year period is considerable: $5000 minus $1500 equals $3500 – over a five year period, the rate of return is 233%. If that air conditioner cost $10,000 to install, however, then over a five-year period it would show a negative rate of return — you’d have been better off with the old system. Most appliances and power systems have an expected lifespan; if your air conditioner is designed to last for 20 years, then even a $10,000 system that saves $1000 per year will show a positive ROI. If it’s expected to last less than ten years, then the ROI will be negative. Economically speaking, it’s a bad investment. Accountants refer to the period of time it takes for a new investment to pay back its original cost as the “payback” — for a $10,000 system that saves $1000 per year, the payback is ten years. For a $1500 system that does the same thing, the payback is just 18 months.

Solar power systems in Hawaii can have a total payback of around three/four years, because the electricity rates in our state are so high. For most home installers, federal and state tax policies can shorten this period even further. The Federal Business Solar Tax Credit covers 30% of what a photovoltaic system costs, through December 2016. On the other hand, the Hawaii Renewable Energy Tax Credit has no expiration date and provides a 35% credit during the tax year a PV system begins operating. This means that more than half the cost of a new solar system is refunded to the installer in the first year of operation, greatly shortening the payback period and greatly enhancing the ROI.

The use of electricity that is cheaper than that derived from imported energy resources, combined with tax credits, strengthens the case for switching to solar power. It is actually possible to turn a profit over time, even from a seemingly expensive initial investment. The positive ROI from a photovoltaic system adds an economic appeal to the system’s environmental function of providing renewable energy without releasing harmful toxins or greenhouse gases into the environment.

See how much you’ll save with solar: check out our Solar Calculator. It only takes a few seconds:

Last Monday in Kailua, the historic town held its sixty-third annual Independence Day parade, air show, and fireworks. The wonderful community tradition has always been a volunteer effort, and this year the Kailua Fireworks Committee aimed to raise $60,000 to guarantee the show.

In addition to donations from a number of generous local businesses, organizations, and friends of the town, Sunetric stepped up in the final hours with a $25,000 donation — the largest in the events history — to ensure that Kailua’s great tradition could continue in its full glory.

Even a bit of rain couldn’t slow us down. The fireworks started on time and dazzled onlookers for over twenty minutes. We are grateful to be part of a such a wonderful community and a great spectacle, and the sense of pride and togetherness we felt on July 4th and on every day that we live and work in Kailua is inspiring and heartwarming. Thank you, Kailua, for the opportunity to return the favor.

Video of the Coverage on KITV and KGMB

Photos from the Mahalo Rally

More Mahalo Rally photos on Facebook!