HAWAIʻI STATE ENERGY OFFICE SECURES $1.8 MILLION TO ADVANCE ENERGY, LAND USE AND DISASTER PLANNING TOOLS
HONOLULU — As part of nearly $34 million in new federal funding secured by U.S. Senator Brian Schatz, the Hawai‘i State Energy Office (HSEO) will receive $1.8 million to expand advanced energy, land use and disaster planning visualization tools in partnership with the University of Hawai‘i Laboratory for Advanced Visualization & Applications (UH LAVA).
The funding supports the continued development of the Hawai‘i Advanced Visualization Energy Nexus (HAVEN) system — an interactive 3D platform that helps policymakers, planners and communities better understand complex energy infrastructure, land-use tradeoffs and resilience planning decisions. HAVEN makes technical planning data accessible to users with varying levels of expertise, supporting transparent and informed decision making across the state.
As Hawai‘i moves to increase energy security and modernize its aging grid, communities face difficult choices around infrastructure siting, regional impacts and costs. HAVEN enables users to visualize scenarios, explore planning model inputs and outputs, and assess cascading impacts related to energy, land use and disaster preparedness.
“HAVEN visualization technologies have proven to be extremely effective in making energy plans and analysis more approachable,” says Chris Yunker, managing director of resilience, clean transportation and analytics for HSEO. “The resulting energy plans incorporate informed input from policy makers and local communities.”
“HAVEN represents a new generation of planning tools that combine immersive visualization, geospatial intelligence and emerging AI capabilities,” adds Jason Leigh, director of UH LAVA. “With this support, we can scale these technologies statewide while training the next generation of visualization, data science and AI professionals here in Hawaiʻi.”
Funding for the HAVEN initiative will leverage HSEO’s nationally recognized Geospatial Decision Support System (GDSS), an award-winning platform used to support emergency response, resilience planning and prioritization of critical infrastructure investments. The GDSS maps the interdependencies within Hawaiʻi’s energy supply chain as well as the dependencies of critical community lifeline services that depend on it, including hospitals, shelters, first responders and food and water.
HAVEN also supports Hawaiʻi State Energy Office (HSEO) as the regional partner for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Energy Technology Innovation Partnership Program (ETIPP). ETIPP provides technical assistance to communities facing energy resilience challenges. HAVEN’s interactive visualization capabilities can be leveraged throughout the ETIPP strategic planning and technical deep-dive processes to help communities visualize energy system options, evaluate resilience and affordability impacts, and support informed local decision making.
Over a multiyear period, HSEO and UH LAVA will expand HAVEN’s capabilities, integrate complementary visualization tools and explore the use of AI to support semi-autonomous engagement to expand the scale of visualization deployment. The HAVEN project also supports workforce development by providing University of Hawai‘i graduate students with hands-on experience in advanced data visualization.