New webpage makes it easy to track Hawaiian Electric’s performance

by Alan Yonan Jr. | May 5, 2022

It’s been a while since I got a report card. Back when I was in school it was an actual piece of paper you brought home every quarter with letter grades from A to F.

Those days are long gone for me, but at Hawaiian Electric we’re making it easier for customers to track our progress toward meeting performance targets designed to support Hawaii’s renewable energy policies while ensuring the financial integrity of the company. It’s sort of like getting a report card.

We’ve launched a Performance Scorecards and Metrics webpage where customers can see progress the company is making in areas such as energy affordability, reliability, customer equity, greenhouse gas emissions reduction, electrification of transportation and resilience.

The webpage is an element of a new regulatory framework known as performance-based regulation, or PBR, that went into effect in 2021. PBR incentivizes the company to achieve goals to advance an equitable, affordable clean energy transition in Hawaii. The scorecards and metrics are based on a suite of “performance incentive mechanisms” approved by the Public Utilities Commission last year as part of the PBR rollout.

PBR provides a greater connection between our achievement of climate-related and social goals and its financial performance. For example, under PBR, the utility now has financial incentives tied to performance on:

• Accelerating achievement of Hawaii’s renewable portfolio standard
• Achieving faster interconnection times for new distributed energy resources
• Efficiently acquiring grid services capabilities from distributed energy resources
• Collaborating to deliver energy savings for low- to moderate-income customers
• Effectively deploying and enabling advanced meters to enable smart grid capabilities

In 2021, Hawaiian Electric accrued $3.7 million in estimated performance incentive rewards (net of penalties from performance incentives established prior to PBR). The Hawaii Public Utilities Commission, our company and other stakeholders continue to consider opportunities to refine and improve the framework.

In addition, we delivered $8 million in customer savings in 2021 through efficiency and productivity measures while also advancing its climate change action plan. Continuing to manage costs will remain a central focus as we operate under the new PBR framework. We’ll continue to identify and execute on efforts that reduce costs, through improved planning and scheduling of work, process improvement initiatives, strategic sourcing of goods and services and reducing our office footprint.

We’re striving for straight As.

Alan Yonan Jr. is a senior communications specialist at Hawaiian Electric.