STAND. COM. REP. NO. 341

 

Honolulu, Hawaii

                  

 

RE:    S.B. No. 16

       S.D. 1

 

 

 

Honorable Donna Mercado Kim

President of the Senate

Twenty-Seventh State Legislature

Regular Session of 2013

State of Hawaii

 

Madam:

 

     Your Committees on Energy and Environment and Public Safety, Intergovernmental and Military Affairs, to which was referred S.B. No. 16 entitled:

 

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO ENERGY RESOURCES,"

 

beg leave to report as follows:

 

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to:

 

     (1)  Require the appropriate county permitting agency, rather than the Energy Resources Coordinator, to receive and process applications for variances for the solar water heating system requirement for building permits;

 

     (2)  Require each respective county council to establish procedures and standards by which its respective county permitting agency approves, approves with conditions, or disapproves variances; and

 

     (3)  Clarify existing solar water heater variance application procedures.

 

     Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism; Hawaii Association of Realtors; Sierra Club Hawaii Chapter; Blue Planet Foundation; and one individual.  Your Committees received testimony in opposition to this measure from the County of Maui, Hawaii Gas, and one individual.

 

     Your Committees find that county permitting agencies, rather than the state Energy Resources Coordinator, should have the responsibility to process solar water heating system variance applications because the county permitting agencies are closer to the particular conditions of the various geographic regions and climatic peculiarities of their respective counties.

 

     Your Committees have amended this measure by:

 

     (1   Changing the term "variance" to "waiver" wherever it is used throughout the Act;

 

     (2)  Authorizing the counties, rather than licensed architects and mechanical engineers, to set criteria for granting waivers; and

 

     (3)  Clarifying the standards for demand water heaters.

 

     As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Energy and Environment and Public Safety, Intergovernmental and Military Affairs that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 16, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 16, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.

 

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Energy and Environment and Public Safety, Intergovernmental and Military Affairs,

 

____________________________

WILL ESPERO, Chair

 

____________________________

MIKE GABBARD, Chair