Yesterday, with the Hawaiian Canoe Racing Association State Championship races in Hilo ending the season, the focus now shifts to long distance races. As teams train for the Na Wahine O Ke Kai and Molokai Hoe races, this may be an opportune time to share an excerpt from a chapter I wrote for Infrastructure Investor's Infrastructure Risk Management: Assessing and Managing Dynamic Exogenous Risks published by PEI Alternative Insight where I used Hawaii's rainforests and the outrigger canoe to make a significant point about the synergy required for an energy transformation for a reader audience outside of Hawaii.
Navigating transformation: Understanding and accepting a new
paradigm
To avoid a prisoner’s dilemma [see my May 30 post], cooperation is inadequate to
describe the necessary dynamics for an energy transformation. As keen observers
of their natural and human environments and as practitioners in systems
thinking, the strategies and concepts that must be embraced for a successful
transformation are not foreign to Hawaiʹi’s peoples and are embedded in their
heritage and values. A proverb, I ka nānā no a ʹike (meaning ‘by observing one learns’) and
the Hawaiian value of Kākou (meaning ‘inclusiveness’), identify the
essential components necessary to understand and accept a new paradigm through
two analogies.
As an island
environment, and as a potential microcosm of what larger electric systems will
eventually face in the future, a Hawaiʹi
biomimicry analogy may be the best example to conceptualize how multiple
transactions resulting from new technologies and services should interplay
within Hawaiʹi’s electric systems to seamlessly optimize
both individual and utility investments for mutual benefit.
Hawaiʹi’s
rainforests are an example of a diverse, complex system where each native
forest organism is distinct but, while unique, must rely on other native forest
organisms for sustenance and optimum growing conditions. Therefore, each
organism must work both interdependently and cooperatively to produce a
productive and efficient ecosystem that is the primary source of Hawaiʹi’s
water supply. While it is difficult to put a value on the required synergy and
the role of each native forest organism’s contribution to capture rainfall, the
result, Hawaiʹi’s reliable water supply, is priceless.
But it should be
noted that in a rainforest environment not all roles are equal. In an even
smaller environment – an ocean-faring, six-man outrigger canoe – business
consultant Rosa Say helps us to understand the interaction among the
stakeholders to capture this synergy, conceptualizing the regulator as the
steersman, the electric utility sitting in seat one, new technologies in seat
two and the customers and other stakeholders in seats three, four and five:
“There is a purpose for each of those six
seats, and each is critical in the canoe. For instance the stroker is the
pacesetter who sits in seat one, the one with the best view of the swells that
are most imminent, the one who will set the rhythm every other paddler follows.
Seat two matches the timing of the stroker on the opposite side of the canoe,
and he is thought of as an alert communicator, especially when the ocean winds
prevent voices from being heard from the last seat to the first. Knowing he has
this back-up, the stroker will concentrate on the consistency of his pace. The
steersman occupies seat six, the last seat, and is the ultimate decision-maker,
however he trusts the stroker to adjust pace as he steers direction.
The steersman is also the captain, and he
must know of the individual talent and strength of each and every paddler
before he assigns the seat they will occupy. Most watermen will agree that all
paddlers must have the common traits of discipline, tenacity, focus and
endurance. However there are differences too, and a role for each seat that
values these differences; qualities such as physical strength or alertness are
valued more so in one seat over another.
... It takes the harmonious disciplined
stroke of all six together to make the canoe surge forward through the surf
with the least amount of effort, reserving the power of each when it is most
needed. It takes every element of Lōkahi (agreement, cooperation and
collaboration), and Kākou is achieved when the collaboration has
resulted in perfect harmony and unity.[1]
In open ocean racing
in an outrigger canoe, the goal is to reach your destination as fast as possible
by optimizing each synchronized stroke and taking advantage of ocean swells,
winds and currents, which the steersman is observant of in order to steer
effectively and which the stroker can match with the appropriate pace. If the course or elements are read
incorrectly, if the stroker cannot match the pace with conditions or if any one
paddler is out of sync, the canoe will struggle to move forward expending
needless effort and creating frustration among the crew.
These analogies
describe the synergistic relationships necessary to transform Hawaiʹi’s
electric systems to induce competitive markets among those providing various
services who must also work cooperatively to optimize all utility, customer and
third-party assets in order to maintain the function of the grid thus ensuring
the delivery of a safe, affordable and reliable electricity service, which is
the foundation for a robust economy as well as Hawaiʹi’s
quality of life. This synergy, familiar to the Hawaiian culture as Kākou, is a call for collective action to
achieve an optimal outcome.
Simply put, in Hawaiʹi’s
parlance, energy transformation is a Kākou thing – we are in this together.
Conclusion
Hawaiʹi’s energy landscape is often described
as a postcard from the future. As closed and bounded systems, the islands of Hawaiʹi are a manageable unit of study of
complex systems that can change in a very short time period compared to a larger,
continental area. Therefore, Hawaiʹi
is a bellwether of what is to come for bigger electric networks and systems. Optimistically,
the postcard will beckon one to a competitive-cooperative partnership within a
seamless electric system paradise, a sustainable model that can be exported
throughout the world. Or the postcard will heed warnings from an electric
system dystopia where the commons have been ravaged solely for short-term
gains. I hope for the former.
[1] Say, Rosa. 2004. Managing with
Aloha: Bringing Hawaii’s Universal Values to the Art of Business. (Hawaii:
Hoʹohana Publishing) at 119-120.
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