Renewable Energy Procurement (RFP Docket No. 2017-0352) — Stage 3 RFPs & Interconnection Dispute Resolution Process

Stage 3 RFPs

Stage 3 RFP: In December 2023, Hawaiian Electric announced the Final Award Group for the Stage 3 RFP. This group includes 7 projects for Oahu, 4 for Maui, and 4 for Hawaii Island, totaling over 1,170 MW of capacity and 2,144 MWh of battery storage. Hawaiian Electric and the project developers are now negotiating Power Purchase Agreements (“PPAs”) and conducting interconnection studies. PPAs may come before the Commission for approval by the end of 2024. Projects can be viewed at Hawaiian Electric’s Renewable Project Status Board.

INTERCONNECTION DISPUTE RESOLUTION PROCESS (“IDRP”)

On April 18, 2023, the Commission established a new Interconnection Dispute Resolution Process (“IDRP”) to be available to projects bidding into the Stage 3 RFP, by Order No. 39163. The IDRP is one of multiple new policies that the Commission has approved to improve the interconnection process of grid-scale renewable energy projects in light of recent delays that projects in the Stage 1 and 2 RFPs encountered. The IDRP was developed by the Independent Engineer (“IE”) and based on similar processes that have been adopted in other jurisdictions. The IDRP is intended to provide an expedited process for resolving disagreements and disputes that may arise during a project’s proposal and development phases including, but not limited to, interconnection study assumptions and findings, interconnection equipment requirements, interconnection cost allocation, or any other issue related to interconnection and requiring engineering judgement.

The IDRP will involve up to three levels of dispute resolution, depicted in the following figure. To initiate the IDRP, a dispute must be submitted via email to the IE and the Independent Observer (“IO”) of the RFP. For more details on how the process works, please review Attachment 1 of Order No. 39163.

MORE INFORMATION

To see more and view all filed documents in the docket, see Docket No. 2017-0352.

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Updated 1/2024