Report Title:

PUC; Capital Projects

Description:

Bifurcates the process of authorizing capital projects by separating need and reasonable route or location of facilities or infrastructure, by requiring a utility to obtain formal authorization of need for a capital cost above $500,000 to be completed before any permits can be issued to utilities for proposed uses.

THE SENATE

S.B. NO.

598

TWENTY-SECOND LEGISLATURE, 2003

 

STATE OF HAWAII

 


 

A BILL FOR AN ACT

 

RELATING TO THE PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION.

 

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF HAWAII:

SECTION 1. Chapter 269, Hawaii Revised Statutes, is amended by adding a new section to be appropriately designated and to read as follows:

"§269- Authorization of need; conservation district use permits. Whenever a regulated utility proposes a capital project within the boundaries of the conservation district for which an environmental impact statement is required under chapter 343, the commission shall issue an order authorizing or denying the need and scope of the project prior to the acceptance of a completed application for a conservation district use permit by the department of land and natural resources under section 183C-6.

The commission shall adopt rules under chapter 91 to implement this section. The rules shall include requirements for submitting an application for project authorization and provisions for public notice, hearing, and comment on the issue of the need and scope of any project for which a permit is applied for under this section."

SECTION 2. Section 183C-6, Hawaii Revised Statutes, is amended by amending subsection (b) to read as follows:

"(b) The department shall render a decision on a completed application for a permit within one-hundred-eighty days of its acceptance by the department. In the case of a public utility proposing a capital project within the boundaries of the conservation district for which an environmental impact statement is required pursuant to chapter 343, no application shall be deemed to be complete until the department has received an order from the public utilities commission authorizing the need and scope of the proposed action pursuant to section 269-   . If within one-hundred-eighty days after acceptance of a completed application for a permit, the department shall fail to give notice, hold a hearing, and render a decision, the owner may automatically put the owner's land to the use or uses requested in the owner's application. When an environmental impact statement is required pursuant to chapter 343, or when a contested case hearing is requested pursuant to chapter 91, the one-hundred-eighty days may be extended an additional ninety days at the request of the applicant. Any request for additional extensions shall be subject to the approval of the board."

SECTION 3. New statutory material is underscored.

SECTION 4. This Act shall take effect upon its approval.

INTRODUCED BY:

_____________________________