The federal government has charged that state officials are rushing to approve wind power projects without adequately considering environmental impacts, particularly the adverse consequences for an endangered species, the opeapea bat.

The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service asked the Hawaii Public Utilities Commission in a Dec. 27 letter to stop approving any new wind turbines until state and federal officials have had the chance to meet with the facility owners and review the plans.

This could substantially slow down PUC approval of some controversial wind turbine projects, particularly a newly proposed 13-tower wind farm in western Oahu called Palehua, which federal officials said is threatening the opeapea, also known as the Hawaiian hoary bat.

Cory Lum/Civil Beat

“We ask that the PUC delay approval of any new wind facility … including the recently submitted Palehua wind facility project, until the project proponent has met with the Service and DOFAW (state Division of Forestry and Wildlife),” wrote Mary Abrams, the Honolulu-based field supervisor for the Pacific Islands Fish & Wildlife Office.

In November, Hawaiian Electric Company sought PUC approval of a power purchase agreement with Eurus Energy America that would be the basis for building the new wind farm in Makakilo, near Kapolei.

Typically the PUC has quickly approved these kinds of contracts, with environmental reviews taking place much later. In January 2015, for example, the PUC approved a contract between Hawaiian Electric and Champlin/GEI Wind Holdings for a 10-turbine wind farm called Na Pua Makani to be located in Kahuku.

State environmental regulators approved its habitat conservation plan more than three years later, in May 2018, stirring criticism that the environmental impacts were given only secondary attention. Kahuku residents who opposed the project said it would kill too many bats.

The letter from federal officials comes at a time of heightened criticism of wind farm projects in Hawaii. Some environmentalists believe the projects have been oversold as a way of reducing the state’s dependence on fossil fuels because they cause other environmental damage.

Bat Deaths Increase

North Shore residents were initially supportive of the Kawailoa Wind Farm near Waimea Bay, which consists of 30 wind turbines that are each 493 feet high, because they were eager to endorse new kinds of green energy.

But when the huge towers were erected in 2012, many people were surprised by how they dominated the landscape, and then upset to learn that the spinning arms had killed 83 opeapea bats

Many North Shore residents have protested a proposal from Kawailoa Wind Farm that it be allowed to increase the number of bats it is allowed to kill, or as it is called in industry jargon, to “take,” from the 60 originally permitted to 265 in coming years.

Forest and Kim Starr

More than 500 people have signed a petition on change.org asking state officials to reject the wind power company’s request because they say the firm is not doing enough to reduce the number of bat deaths and mitigate damages to their habitat.