Pat Takahashi and Andy Twomey after today's Energy Futures show.With the Expo dominating energy news in the Aloha State this week, Energy Futures invited two participating companies to be on the show – Lockheed Martin and Phycal Hawaii. Lockheed, of course, has decades of ocean thermal energy conversion (OTEC) experience, while Phycal is a start-up company with plans to harvest oil from algae as feedstock for liquid fuels, including eventually becoming a replacement for diesel and jet fuel.
Dr. Ted Johnson, the public face of Lockheed’s OTEC aspirations, was unable to be with us due to a prior commitment, so we talked with Lockheed program manager Robert Varley from his home in Virginia. When asked for a timeline for Lockheed’s proposed pilot OTEC plant here, Rob said a 10-MW plant could up operational by 2016 – assuming relatively early funding.
Phycal Hawaii was represented by President Andrew Twomey, a returning Hawaii resident; earlier this decade he commanded a brigade of the 25th infantry Division at Schofield Barracks. His company intends to start operations with a 40-acre facility to produce 100,000 gallons of algae oil for proof-of-concept before expanding to fill a need to replace diesel and jet fuel at a competitive price.
Former Hawaii Natural Energy Institute director Pat Takahashi joined us in the studio as a “guest questioner,” and as usual, we were better informed thanks to Pat’s involvement. Monday's show will be archived at Hawaii Public Radio sometime on Tuesday, September 1.
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