Hawaiian Electric, Pacific Biodiesel partner for holiday rice drive, recipe contest

Photo: Hawaiian Electric

Hawaiian Electric and Pacific Biodiesel are teaming up for the holidays to support local food banks and encourage local ingredients for holiday recipes.

The collaboration—“Kakou for the Holidays”—includes a rice drive and a holiday-recipe contest.

“We’re collaborating with Pacific Biodiesel over the holidays to celebrate our ongoing partnership of using their locally sourced biofuel for our electric grid,” said Mike DeCaprio, vice president of power supply for Hawaiian Electric. “Kakou for the Holidays is a way for us to come together to support our communities and honor our companies working together for clean energy in Hawaii.”

Employees of both companies are participating in a rice drive to collect bags and boxes of rice for donation to food banks on each island.

One of the most requested items at food banks, rice is a staple for local families that can be easily distributed to individual folks across Hawaii for their holiday meals.

“During our first holiday rice drive last year, Pacific Biodiesel employees donated nearly 600 pounds rice for local food banks,” said Jenna Long, Pacific Biodiesel’s director of operations. “This holiday season, Hawaiian Electric’s 2,500 employees are joining us in collecting bags and boxes of rice for donation to Hawaii’s food banks. The holiday season is a critical time for food banks, and the government shutdown has increased food needs across our communities. We’re honored to partner with Hawaiian Electric to support local food banks and we encourage folks to consider donating to the food banks now more than ever.”

Additionally, Pacific Biodiesel founders Bob and Kelly King will be donating to each island’s food bank a supply of their company’s new Kuleana® Hawaii Grown Sunflower Oil—produced from the sunflowers Pacific Biodiesel farms on Kauai and Maui.

The holiday-recipe contest launched Nov. 18 and runs through Dec. 15.

Recipes must be prepared with local ingredients, such as Kuleana® Hawaii Grown Sunflower Oil, and can include recipes from Hawaiian Electric’s “The Electric Kitchen” recipe collection on the company’s website.

Pacific Biodiesel reminds the community to recycle (not discard down the drain) household used cooking oil leftover from holiday meal preparation.

Locations that accept household used cooking oil are listed on biodiesel.com.

Pacific Biodiesel recycles used cooking oil for its local biodiesel production.

The company, which marks its 30th anniversary this year, annually produces nearly 6 million gallons of biodiesel and has been Hawaii’s only commercial producer of liquid biofuel for three decades.

Pacific Biodiesel has been supplying biodiesel for Hawaiian Electric since 2003.

In June, Pacific Biodiesel made its first delivery of biodiesel produced solely with sunflower oil from the company’s expanded agriculture operations on Kauai.

A tanker with 6,500 gallons of biodiesel, a 100 percent renewable fuel produced at the company’s refinery on Hawaii Island, was delivered to Hawaiian Electric for its 50-megawatt Schofield Generating Station on Oahu.

Hawaiian Electric will randomly select five prize winners from all qualified “Kakou for the Holidays” recipe-contest entrants.

Winners will each receive a Hawaiian Electric tumbler and a bottled set of 8.5 oz Kuleana® Hawaii Grown Sunflower Oil and Macadamia Oil.

For information about the contest or to learn how you can support Hawaii’s food banks this holiday season, visit hawaiianelectric.com/recipecontest or biodiesel.com.

To learn more about Kuleana Hawaii Grown culinary oils, visit KuleanaHawaiiOils.com.