Hawaiian Electric Enhances Resilience Across Five Islands it Serves in 2025

In 2025, Hawaiian Electric replaced many utility poles, trimmed vegetation, overhauled underground equipment and installed technology to reduce wildfire and outage risks across the five islands it serves, thus enhancing resilience.

Many projects focused on areas challenged by older equipment, more frequent service interruptions and/or higher wildfire risk.

Highlights of ongoing or completed work include the following projects:

• Hawaii Island crews are rebuilding a section of the transmission line inside Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. Crews have relocated and upgraded 69 utility poles, and installation of new equipment along Hawaii Belt Road is expected to be completed by the end of 2025.
• In downtown Honolulu and Chinatown, where customers experienced a major outage in 2024, crews have made progress on a multiyear program to replace and upgrade the underground network to improve reliability.
• On Oahu, crews replaced aging underground cable causing service interruptions in Nanakuli, Mililani and Kaneohe. More than a half-mile of cable was replaced in Nanakuli from late February to mid-June, over two miles replaced in Mililani neighborhoods and over a mile replaced in Kaneohe near Windward Mall. Currently, crews are replacing cable in lower Hahaione in East Honolulu.
• In East Honolulu, crews upgraded multiple utility poles and installed equipment near Kalanianaole Highway and Hanauma Bay Nature Preserve, improving wildfire safety in the area. The work involved evacuations, planned outages and use of helicopters.
• In the Olinda area on Maui, Hawaiian Electric has expanded hazard tree removals as part of ongoing vegetation management efforts. The work includes coordination with landowners for removal of invasive tree debris. In addition, installation of insulated power lines in Upcountry Maui will continue through January.

Planned resilience and reliability work requiring widespread scheduled outages or major traffic impacts are expected to pause during the holidays.