This is one of the goals of environmentalism: put up roadblocks on efforts to protect people from disasters, like wildfires, that result in property destruction and death. This time, they had a little help from Wall Street.

During the 2019 wildfire season, one of the worst Maui had ever seen, Hawaiian Electric concluded that it needed to do far more to prevent its power lines from emitting sparks.

The utility examined California’s plans to reduce fires ignited by power lines, started flying drones over its territory and vowed to take steps to protect its equipment and its customers from the threat of fire. 

Nearly four years later, the company has completed little such work. Between 2019 and 2022, it invested less than $245,000 on wildfire-specific projects on the island, regulatory filings show. It didn’t seek state approval to raise rates to pay for broad wildfire-safety improvements until 2022, and has yet to receive it.

Now, the company is facing scrutiny, litigation and a financial crisis over indications that its power lines might have played a role in igniting the deadliest U.S. wildfire in more than a century. The blaze has caused at least 110 deaths, destroyed the historic town of Lahaina and resulted in an estimated billions of dollars in damage. 

The Journal also points out that Hawaii Electric was concerned about the condition of its electrical grid and wildfire risk, but did so with minimal effort to prevent fire risk while focusing more of its efforts on the company’s green energy goals. What’s worse is that BlackRock and Vanguard are the largest holders of Hawaii Electric stock and no doubt they somehow influenced the utility to pursue so-called green energy sources of power.

Consequently, Hawaii Electric delays capital improvements in its infrastructure and ignores its own warnings of needing to do so in order to meet unrealistic climate change goals that, in turn, results in decaying power lines which can start fires given the right circumstances. Hawaiian officials then delay sounding alarms to residents when a wild fire breaks out, including holding up fresh water that can be used to combat the blaze. Then, to avoid the consequences of their stupidity, Aloha state politicos blame climate change (or something) with a little help from their media sycophants.

PHOTO CREDIT: August 8 fire above Kīhei, HI -By Kahunapule Michael Johnson – https://www.flickr.com/photos/kahunapulej/53110609698/in/dateposted/, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=135890707