Two Days at RE + Hawaii
This Maui Panel at RE Plus led by former Maui County Energy Commissioner Alex de Roode founder of Ha Sustainability
AJ Perkins - President of Instant On Energy (copyright Michael Markrich photo)
Living in Hawaii one does not often get a chance to meet people from around the United States discussing the cutting edge trends of renewable Energy. RE plus was an oppportunity to meet speakers and vendors of technology throughout the energy world. We caught up with AJ Perkins the President of Instant on Energy.
MM
AJ what is your impression of the RE + Clean Energy Conference that took place January 14-15 in Hawaii 2025?
AJ
I think the biggest thing that I have seen is this idea of collaboration. We have groups from the Continental US coming down here.
They are saying “what’s gong on in Hawaii?” We’d like to help!” We have people from within the local communities. Native Hawaiians.
We have people (from the Mainland) who have been here for a little while and people who have been here a for a long time.
And they are all saying the same thing” We could actually use some help.” The sharing of ideas and tThe sharing of knowledge has
been really beautiful. And we are not talking just about solar, we are talking about hydrogen, geothermal, nuclear. These guys are pushing the bar.
MM
Do you feel that a new generation of people has entered the energy business in Hawaii and is stepping up to meet the
challenge?
AJ
It’s interesting you should say so I was at RE+in Anaheim and we have got everybody. (In Anaheim we have a lot of people with 40 years in the business and are veterans in the industry and you look around here (in Hawaii) and this event and we’ve got (not just young people but people from) all walks of life and we have got the young generation (from Hawaii) that’s not just here because they have to be because they want to be here! They actively participate. They are having active conversations. They are actively involved and want to make sure their children are able to participate in this energy transformation that we are talking about.
MM
During the panel yesterday one of the speakers representing the Native Hawaiians said people 'come to us all the time and they want to bring us all these complicated expensive renewable energy projects and after a while (we are overwhlemed and ) we don’t even want to listen anymore”.
AJ
Yes. That’s a true statement
MM
Are people trying to sell too much? Is it too much to absorb?.
AJ
This is what I have experienced. I was talking to the new Big island Mayor (Kimo Alameda) last week and he said, :"You know AJ, all these people
Are talking about solar and batteries and hydrogen and all this stuff!” The challenge I see is that (all the vendors) are myopic in
their view points.. They say I sell hydrogen, I sell solar , I sell batteries…” I think we are always going to be facing that issue. ( I understand) Everybody is trying to sell a product or sell a service. The problem is
we don’t need individual pieces we need (somone to see whats needed as a whole), a group that can come over and say 'I see your problem and here’s a holistic approach'.
For example: "This problem requires solar and battery;
"That problem requires something different;This needs structure and communications.;This needs water." So unfortunately because (things are bought and sold piecemeal) (communities in Hawaii) are going to be stuck with a lot of different stuff that maybe doesn’t fit (their needs) in the big picture. “
Aloha
Story # 3 - The New Hydrogen Industry and Stars Technology by Jocelyn Stara
Stars Chemical Process Technology to turn gas into Hydrogen
STARS Technology Corporation is based in Washington State, and was formed in 2016 with a current team of five people, the President of the company being Robert Wegneg, who had previously worked with NASA and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) along with other current STARS team members. STARS specializes in creating microchannel chemical reactors that work in chemical intensifications. STARS stands for Solar Thermal Advanced Reactor System. The original system they created in effort to make hydrogen from gas holds a world record Solar to chemical energy conversion efficiency of 72% as measured by PNNL.”We are not directly using the sun to heat the reactor now as was done initially but in honor of our founding, we decided to keep the STARS anagram.” When interviewed, Dennis Walters, the Chief of Staff at STARS, stated the purpose of the company is “ To demonstrate a sustainable and scalable business model with the potential, in the near-term, to make affordable and clean hydrogen available with onsite production.”
STARS Technology Corporation's advanced Steam Methane Reforming (SMR) technology enables production of hydrogen from water and methane in components that are 1/100th the size of competing technologies
STARS technology has created a state-of-the-art hydrogen generator, a steam methane reformer ( SMR), which can be added to the natural fuel lines to produce hydrogen fuel. Walters states the system works by “Transforming the natural gas to hydrogen onsite in a modular system that has an input from water and methane at the front of the system and an output of hydrogen at the back end of the system.” This technology requires no additional drilling or piping, and the generator can be attached to the already present natural gas grid. What makes STARS technology different from other hydrogen reformers is that STARS technology uses,“ 1/100th the volume of conventional hardware” explained Walters. It also takes only milliseconds compared to together models, which take tens of seconds.
This is a hydrogen generator at a strategic location where natural gas is turned into hydrogen to power buses. Similar generators
could be used power hydrogen buses in Hawaii.
By producing the same amount of hydrogen as conventional system that are 100x larger, the STARS hydrogen generator provides an alternative to large central production plants. Because hydrogen can be produced on site to charge buses and other verhicles there is no need to transport the hydrogen,. This cuts hydrogen costs down by over 50%.
The bottom line is that this state-of-the-art technology can completely change the renewable energy field because it is the first of its kind to be eco-friendly and has comparable costs to fossil fuels. After a successful two year trial run of using STARS technology to supply hydrogen energy for public buses in California, the company is hopeful that mass production and delivery of the generators can begin in 2026 and commercial use of the technology will soon follow.
Dennis Walters, STARS Technology Corporation Chief of Staff
A system like this hydrogen generator could be a game changer in areas of limited space, such as Hawaii. Hawaii has been pushing for clean energy practices and after severe backlash from the wind farms on Oahu, hydrogen energy could be the solution. While Hawaii predominantly uses propane for its energy, small changes can be made to incorporate the production of methane in Hawaii, such as hemp farming, which has methane as a byproduct. If methane was accessible on the island, the hydrogen generator could be incorporated on the island at a low cost and would help Hawaii reach its goal of 100% clean energy by 2045.
Jacky Bainum, president I-NALYTICS setting up a GIS measuring point in a utility easement near the San Andreas fault in California
I-NALYTICS - A valuable new tool in renewable energy management
By Jocelyn Stara
I-NALYTICS is a company created to take Geographic Information System (GIS) mapping and utilize its many applications to benefit local communities. As Jacky Barnum, company president and owner says:“You cannot put solar panels in an area with insufficient sunlight or a wind turbine in an area within insufficient wind coverage. The planning and data needs for new energy plants need to be recorded on on-line maps to find the optimal locations. It can be a long and tedious process. With their technology and data, collection tools (Trmble units (https://utilities.trimble.com/en-us/products/mobile-devices), heat sensors, drones etc), I-NALYTICS staff can collect data and portray where resources should go.”
Biofuels plant at Kawaihae, on the Island of Hawaii, which was measured using GIS technology
Barnum became interested in using GIS technology while a student at Hawaii Pacific University (HPU). She later received a degree in business management from Texas A and M University. “The introduction to the GIS class I took at HPU in 2003 opened my eyes to the power of data visualization for individuals and organizations. The Tribal government I have been working for is Cabazon Band of Cahuilla Indians and I was both the Director of Planning and Operations and the Interim General Manager for the Cabazon Tribal Utility Authority. When I began working with Tribal governments and resource management, I noticed the inefficiencies of using paper log books, notes, and maps. High turnover rates resulted in work products within Tribal governments being lost during transitions, leading to constant recreation of these materials. This situation causes critical information to be unavailable or poorly communicated to Tribal Councils, who depend on staff-provided information to make decisions. It also results in wasted funds. Many of these Tribal programs are grant funded.To address these issues, I founded I-nalytics. My goal was to deliver cost savings and mitigate the impact of employee turnover by digitizing assets and data points. We consolidate these vital pieces of information into a database and analyze the data spatially. This allows us to create maps that help decision-makers visualize data and make informed choices.”
Jacky Barnum president and founder of I-NALYTICS. Former director Director of Planning and Operations and the Interim General Manager for the Cabazon Tribal Utility Authority
I-NALYTICS has used GIS mapping and data analysis to benefit communities in different ways, such as creating a central data base for all utilities in a Native American community and performing wetland assessments. The usage of GIS tracking would be valuable in the renewable energy field due to its ability to map prime locations for different energy sources whether it is solar, wind, or wave energy. Once inputted into GIS maps, the information allows energy planners and developers to to better explain in the clearest possible way the optimal ways to plan for renewables in every community; specifically by showing people quickly where and where not renewable resources should be located. As Barnum says I-NALYTICS can collect data and portray it in a way that tells a story, whether it is through a heat map, spatial interpolation, or other styles of visually representing data. The implications and uses are almost infinite”
How I-NALYTICS could benefit Hawaii.
As Hawaii moved towards making the Islands 100% renewable by 2045 community engagement is key, One of her clients is a group of Hawaii businessmen developing a biomass plant on the the Big Island which plans to grow industrial hemp and burn it as biomass to create electricity. As Barnum says,
“When thinking of mapping and its utilizations, most companies only think of mapping in its literal sense such as portraying aerial ground footage or land masses. With modern-day technology and its advancements, the implications of mapping are so much more than an x-y coordinate map and would highly benefit the renewable energy field. A prime example of this would be if the city of Honolulu partnered with I-NALYTICS o take the highly dense populated area of Honolulu and create a map showing which areas would benefit the most from solar panels and which locations would create the most efficient solar energy. They would be able to create different visual maps showing potential layouts for the solar panels and show which allow for the highest rates of efficiency. Solar energy is not the only form of renewable energy that could benefit from using the technology and data analysis from I-NALYTICS, wind energy and wave energy could also benefit.”
The wide range of data collection tools allows I-NALYTICS to be widely versatile and work in many different scenarios. Hawaii could also use the technology to help map the different invasive species in Hawaii to help the removal and restoration process currently being done on Island. By using the power of community engagement and technological advancements, I-NALYTICS allows communities the opportunity to make more informed decisions and future plans through data analysis. As Barnum says “ It is the ability to breathe life into the data, so it is not static , that allows it to tell a story."
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