Propane shortage to shut Liliha Bakery

[zztype]

Propane shortage to shut Liliha Bakery

Employees are urged to use their vacation time as the popular shop faces a temporary closure

By Mary Vorsino
mvorsino@starbulletin.com

A statewide propane shortage could cool Liliha Bakery's ovens as early as tonight.

The popular patisserie on North Kuakini Street in Nuuanu has already canceled hundreds of cake and pastry orders for this week, and is warning customers to expect at least a two-week closure.

http://starbulletin.com/2006/03/12/news/story02.html

[damontucker]

Re: Propane shortage to shut Liliha Bakery

I can see a riot coming on.

100 year war...Civil War...Revolutionary War... Persian Gulf... Iraq...The Coco Puff Rebellion.

[pzarquon]

Re: Propane shortage to shut Liliha Bakery

Saw a short segment on KHON on this. They checked their tank late today and decided they have enough for one more day. Since they're closed on Mondays anyway, Tuesday will be your last day for coco puff goodness for a while.

A pity that there's no high-volume source available, yet supermarket shelves are still stocked with hundreds of those little canisters. I just burned up a whole container yesterday at a picnic.

[Miulang]

Re: Propane shortage to shut Liliha Bakery

At least coco puffs are not absolutely required to sustain life. Think about all the local residents who use propane for cooking... What are they supposed to do? Eat cold Spam, canned pork and beans, Vienna sausage, no hot rice???

Miulang

[Palolo Joe]

Re: Propane shortage to shut Liliha Bakery

What are they supposed to do? Eat cold Spam, canned pork and beans, Vienna sausage, no hot rice???

What to do? What to do? How's about going to a plate lunch spot or restaurant that's serving hot food?

Or... use a microwave?

Never mind that most rental properties come with electric stoves these days.

And never mind that there are things like charcoal grills, electric hot plates and other appliances that can be used to heat/cook food without propane.

Besides, more propane is supposed to be available by the end of the week. The sky is not falling.

[Miulang]

Re: Propane shortage to shut Liliha Bakery

What to do? What to do? How's about going to a plate lunch spot or restaurant that's serving hot food?

Or... use a microwave?

Never mind that most rental properties come with electric stoves these days.

And never mind that there are things like charcoal grills, electric hot plates and other appliances that can be used to heat/cook food without propane.

Besides, more propane is supposed to be available by the end of the week. The sky is not falling.

That may be true in the city, but it's not true in the sticks, where lots of people use propane for cooking and heating.

[Palolo Joe]

Re: Propane shortage to shut Liliha Bakery

That may be true in the city, but it's not true in the sticks, where lots of people use propane for cooking and heating.

Keep telling us how things are here in the islands from your vantage point thousands of miles away in Washington.

The sticks? Oh... you mean out in the country.

I was in Waianae last weekend for a baby's first birthday luau. The biggest gripe wasn't about being able to cook or not. Everyone complained about not having hot water for showers... and the showers that threatened to ruin the party that day.

My cousin in Waimanalo told me the same thing. She's stopped by my house before work a few times since. Problem solved... and I get to spend more time with the cutest niece in the world before mom takes her to school.

Hardly life-threatening. Again, the sky is not falling.

[tutusue]

Re: Propane shortage to shut Liliha Bakery

[...] I was in Waianae last weekend for a baby's first birthday luau. The biggest gripe wasn't about being able to cook or not. Everyone complained about not having hot water for showers... and the showers that threatened to ruin the party that day.
[...]

Definitely not life threatening, but we're feeling the effects in Makaha. We're down to cold water wash cycles only in my condo building's laundry rooms. Don't know if the dryers will be impacted. Today they weren't. Clothes can still dry without 'em! Fortunately hot water in the condos is not affected.

[craigwatanabe]

Re: Propane shortage to shut Liliha Bakery

The one good thing about this shortage is that when the imported stuff comes in you'll be treated with a better quality of propane.

I used to work for the Gas Company and my job was to calibrate those LPG tankers you see running around town. I even calibrated those dispensers that filled those cannisters for the gas grills. We used to measure the specific gravity of the liquid gas. Good commercial grade LPG had a rating of 0.505 better known as HD-505. That sucker would flash into vapor as soon as you could release it. Then there's the crap stuff or anything rated less than (or heavier than HD-505).

This stuff you could literally pour out of a propane tank and watch it pool on the ground. You kick it around with your boots and it sits there like water with a slight hint of boiling action. Typically this kind of gas has a rating of 0.519 specific gravity. This is the stuff that ends up in the dispensers that are used for stuff like gas grills. The better 0.505 is used for delivery to homes and businesses.

That said, even the HD-505 gas produced by Cheveron or Tesoro here in Hawaii at the Campbell Industrial sites never came close to that level. The best I saw was typically 0.509 or 0.511 s.g.

But one day while I was here in Hilo calibrating their tankers, Hilo got a Malaysian barge shipment of propane. When I measured it I was freakin' amazed!!! The 0.505 gas had a benchmark reading of 0.502!! The best damned gas I ever had to rate.

A little research disclosed one important fact: Imported gas has very little EPA restrictions placed on it's refinement at the local plants. Meaning in Malaysia you could get rid of that pesky yellow residue found in most refined gas known as sulphur by blowing out of their stacks at the gas plant. Well here in the good old USA, we have strict environmental laws prohibiting the release of high sulphur emissions, so expensive scrubbers are attached to the stacks to remove the sulphur. Unfortunately not all sulphur is removed with these scrubbers and you get a high level release of sulphur that makes the surrounding areas of Kapolei nauseous.

To remedy that kind of possibility, the gas is simply kept in the final product. This reduces the BTUH capacity of the gas. Ultimately that high sulphur gas settles inside your 124-gallon propane tanks sitting in your yard and you wonder why oh why your energy bill is higher for that last month. It's higher because you had to use more cubic feet of gas to give you the same BTUH output with cheaper gas.

If you had to actually look at LPG thru a sight glass, gas manufactured here in Hawaii takes on a slight yellow ting. That ting is sulphur. Malaysian gas is crystal clear and highly volatile. This is the good stuff.

And who gets this good gas? Usually Oahu never sees the stuff as propane is available thru the two plants. The neighbor islands get the good stuff as they are the only places where the Gas Company can hold barge loads full of gas at any given time. Hilo has a 1-million gallon holder (that big white ball on Kalanianaole Avenue). Maui has two 1-million gallon holders and Kauai has two 1-million gallon holders. Oahu has none. Those gas balls you saw in Mapunapuna and the Unversity area were SNG or Synthetic Natural Gas boosters. They were vapor filled natural gas holders that maintained pressure thru out the leeward side of Oahu in the underground piping system.

Now the Gas Company uses what is called a Propane-air mixer. This device is used when the SNG plant in Campbell Industrial can't meet the demands of public consumption during peak hours or when the plant goes down for scheduled maintenance. The propane air mixer will mix propane and air and inject it into the pipe system. The reason why is that Propane has a higher BTUH rating than natural or synthetic natural gas. So when propane is injected into an SNG system. The gas has to be diluted a bit so the gas pilots don't flame out at your gas water heater.

Right now this is a delicate situation for the Gas Company. If their SNG plant goes down they may not have enough LPG reserves to keep the mixer on long enough to keep the SNG pipes pressurized.

Then you have the Gas Company's two non-utility competitors (Aloha Gas and Oahu Gas better known as AmeriGas) which use LPG entirely frantically searching for product to distribute and sell.

[Surfingfarmboy]

Re: Propane shortage to shut Liliha Bakery

Craig: That is one fascinating post! I always thought that propane was propane..that there was no distinction between samples or that there were various grades, based on the specific gravity. It appears that the lower number of the specific gravity of a sample of propane the better, i.e., one with a SG of .502 is better than one rated .505.

Your post has made me curious as to what grade of gas is coming into my house. I don't have propane coming in, rather I have natural gas, but does natural gas have any sort of grade associated with it?

BTW, seeing that you worked for the Gas Company, you might find it interesting to learn of the method for heating my home. I have a "heating system" known as a "gas on gas stove"...it's a four range stove, an oven, and a heater, all in one. It has no forced air to blow the warmed air around my home..it works on the principle of a wood-fired pot-belled stove; in other words the closer you are to it, the warmer you are. If you happen to get more than 6 feet from it on a cold winter day, you'll instantly feel a difference in the temperature. They are very common in older homes here in New England.

All told, they do a rather poor job of heating. During the winter months, the average temparture inside my home works out to about 58 degrees, and that's with the heater on full-blast. One extremely cold morning, a couple years back, I woke up to find it 38 degrees inside. What's funny about these heaters that a lot of children grow up in New England and think that these heaters (all which were made in the mid 1960's or before) are the only way homes are heated here. Have you ever heard of or dealt with these heaters?

[Erika Engle]

Liliha Bakery back in business

Story's got a great photo, too, but then again, our photogs ROCK.

http://starbulletin.com/2006/03/22/news/story08.html

[kimo55]

Re: Liliha Bakery back in business

Story's got a great photo, too, but then again, our photogs ROCK.

literally and figuratively.

[speedtek]

Re: Propane shortage to shut Liliha Bakery

Hey Craig speak english!

[U'ilani]

Re: Propane shortage to shut Liliha Bakery

What a great photo! Those coco puffs look so fresh and yummy. And check out how thick and fluffy the butter cream looks on top of the pastry!!!!!!!