Expanding on a portion of his State of the City address in January, Honolulu Mayor Jeremy Harris laid out his vision for a more "sustainable" Oahu before a crowd of about 800 yesterday. Harris outlines high-tech
trash-to-energy planHe hopes to set several sustainability
projects in motion before his term endsBy Rod Antone
rantone@starbulletin.comThe islandwide sustainability workshop was held in the Stardust Theater aboard the Norwegian Star cruise liner docked near Aloha Tower.
Hundreds of vision team and neighborhood board members greeted the former gubernatorial candidate with a standing ovation.
"It's nice to get a standing ovation at any time, but it was especially nice today," said Harris, who dropped out of the governor's race a little less than two weeks ago, saying he could not win after polls showed he was behind Republican Linda Lingle.
"We've got 2 1/2 years or more to accomplish all my dreams for the city, and we're not going to let one minute go by without getting as much done as we can."
By the time his term is up in 2005, Harris believes it is possible to get a good portion of his sustainability plan in place.
Included is a $60 million project to double the capacity of the HPOWER garbage to energy plant and research into the feasibility of "plasma-arc" technology.
"(Plasma-arc) zaps the garbage," Harris said. "Let's say it's wood or a tire ... it basically incinerates the rubbish without burning it.
"It can then be used to generate electricity."
Harris' plans to reduce Oahu's solid waste also include building a new recycling sorting center and a recycling technology park, and using the HPOWER ash for roadways by mixing it with asphalt.
Harris said these new ideas and technologies need to be introduced to each community by those present at yesterday's workshop.
"The people have to recognize that this continual consumption of resources and generating waste and pollution, that doesn't work," Harris said.
"We need to start thinking about how are we going to deal with waste products in a way that we don't have to keep filling up our valleys with landfills."
Harris went on to review the need for city projects currently under way, such as the Bus Rapid Transit program, the first segment of which he expects to be ready by the end of his term in 2004.
For much of the workshop, Harris went through some of the 129 vision team projects sponsored by the 19 different teams for fiscal year 2002-2003. They included botanical gardens in Wahiawa and Aina Haina, moving utilities underground on Kailua Road and a number of traffic-calming and park improvement projects.
City & County of Honolulu
