Kahuku Holdings, LLC

CourtCourt of Chancery of Delaware
DecidedSeptember 16, 2014
DocketCA 9991-VCG
StatusPublished

This text of Kahuku Holdings, LLC (Kahuku Holdings, LLC) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Chancery of Delaware primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Kahuku Holdings, LLC, (Del. Ct. App. 2014).

Opinion

COURT OF CHANCERY OF THE SAM GLASSCOCK III STATE OF DELAWARE COURT OF CHANCERY COURTHOUSE VICE CHANCELLOR 34 THE CIRCLE GEORGETOWN, DELAWARE 19947

Date Submitted: August 29, 2014 Date Decided: September 15, 2014

Catherine G. Dearlove Robert A. Penza Brock E. Czeschin Christopher M. Coggins Robert L. Burns Polsinelli PC Elizabeth A. DeFelice 222 Delaware Avenue, Suite 1101 Richards, Layton & Finger, P.A. Wilmington, Delaware 19801 One Rodney Square 920 North King Street Wilmington, Delaware 19801

Michael M. Purpura William M. Harstad Carlsmith Ball LLP ASB Tower 1001 Bishop Street Suite 2100 Honolulu, Hawaii 96813

Re: Kahuku Holdings, LLC and First Wind Kahuku Holdings, LLC v. MNA Kahuku, LLC, Civil Action No. 9991-VCG

Dear Counsel:

This matter involves the arbitrability of a dispute between the two members

of a Delaware LLC created to hold a single asset: a subsidiary operating a wind

farm on the island of Maui in Hawaii. The defendant here filed an arbitration

proceeding in Hawaii, consistent with its understanding of the operative LLC

agreement. The plaintiff filed this action, seeking to enjoin the arbitration. The

defendant then filed a mirror-image action in Hawaii, seeking to compel arbitration. The arbitration itself is effectively stayed, awaiting a decision from

this Court or the Hawaii court on arbitrability. Because I find that the parties

agreed in the LLC agreement to have questions of arbitrability decided before a

court in Hawaii, this action must be stayed or dismissed in favor of the pending

Hawaii action.

I. Background

The parties‘ dispute before this Court arises from a joint venture to operate a

wind generation project in Kahuku, Hawaii (the ―Wind Farm‖).1 In 2010, non-

party entities First Wind Holdings, LLC (―FW Holdings‖) and Makani Nui

Associates, LLC (―Makani‖) entered into a limited liability agreement (the

―Original LLC Agreement‖) to govern Plaintiff Kahuku Holdings, LLC (―Kahuku

Holdings‖), a Delaware entity that had been formed by FW Holdings the previous

month.2 Under the Original LLC Agreement, FW Holdings owned 92% of the

ownership interest of Kahuku Holdings and was its sole manager, while Makani

owned the remaining 8% ownership interest and held no voting rights. In turn,

Kahuku Holdings‘ sole asset was and still is its 100% ownership interest in non-

1 Unless otherwise indicated, the background facts were taken from the Plaintiffs‘ Verified Complaint and subsequent briefing. The origin story of Kahuku Holdings, however, is not entirely developed in the documents submitted by the Plaintiffs; as a result, I have found it helpful to take some non-dispositive facts from the Opening Brief in Support of Defendant MNA Kahuku, LLC‘s Motion to Dismiss. 2 Def.‘s Opening Br. 5. 2 party Kahuku Wind Power, a Delaware limited liability company and the owner

and operator of the Wind Farm.

In 2011, FW Holdings and Makani executed amendments to the Original

LLC Agreement (the ―Amended LLC Agreement‖), the provisions of which are at

issue in this dispute. The Amended LLC Agreement transferred FW Holdings‘

92% ownership interest and role as managing member to Plaintiff First Wind

Kahuku Holdings, LLC (―First Wind‖) and Makani‘s 8% ownership interest to

Defendant MNA Kahuku, LLC (―MNA‖).3 Further, key to the renegotiation, the

Amended LLC Agreement included provisions that granted MNA the right to

provide input in the annual budgeting process and curbed First Wind‘s discretion

in issuing distributions of cash; Section 4.4(a) states: ―Following the end of each

calendar year of the Company, . . . the Company shall distribute the Net Cash of

the Company, if any, to the Members.‖4 The Amended LLC Agreement defines

―Net Cash‖ as:

net cash from operating activities . . . prepared in accordance with [GAAP] . . . but which shall in any event deduct, to the extent not already deducted, (A) debt service . . . , (B) actual expenses, (C) taxes and (D) any amount determined by the Managing Member as necessary to meet the requirement of any third party financing agreements and for reasonable reserves for contingencies and expected expenses.5

3 Id. at 7. 4 Compl. ¶ 17. 5 Id. ¶ 18. 3 The parties also negotiated and adopted an extensive arbitration provision in the

Amended LLC Agreement, which reads in relevant part:

All disputes, claims, or controversies arising out of or relating to the corporate contract . . . between and among the Company, its Members, officers, managers, employees or agents (a ―Dispute‖) shall be resolved by mutual agreement of the Members. If a dispute is not resolved by mutual agreement between the Members within thirty (30) days after the start of the Dispute, a Member may deliver written demand to the Company and the other Members and the Dispute shall be resolved solely and exclusively by binding arbitration to be conducted before Dispute Prevention Resolution, Inc. (―DPR‖) or its successor; provided, that, for purposes of clarification, this arbitration clause does not apply to (a) Member votes or decisions (such as with respect to the Annual budget or Super Majority Vote under SubArticle 7.3 of this Agreement) of the Managing member . . . . The parties will initiate and select a single arbitrator in accordance with DPR‘s prevailing rules and procedures. Any such arbitration shall be held on the island of Maui, State of Hawaii and shall be conducted in accordance with DPR rules and regulations unless specifically modified herein. . . . The provisions of this SubArticle shall be enforceable In [sic] any court of competent jurisdiction. Each of the parties hereto irrevocably and unconditionally consents to the exclusive jurisdiction of the arbitrator to resolve all disputes, claims or controversies arising out of or relating to (i) this Agreement . . . and further consents to the jurisdiction of the courts of the State of Hawaii for the purposes of enforcing the arbitration provisions of this SubArticle.6

Around the same time that the Amended LLC Agreement was adopted, in

April 2011, the Wind Farm became operational. Development and construction of

the Wind Farm had required ―significant‖ up-front costs.7 To cover these

expenses, Kahuku Wind Power entered into a loan agreement for $117,330,968

6 Am. LLC Agreement § 11.13. 7 Compl. ¶ 24. 4 (the ―DOE Loan Agreement‖) with the United States Department of Energy (the

―DOE‖) in July 2010, as well as received capital contributions from First Wind.8

MNA only contributed ―an initial nominal contribution of $80.‖9 Soon after the

project launched, however, the energy storage facilities ―suffered two small fires

and then a catastrophic fire on or about August 1, 2012,‖ causing the Wind Farm to

become completely inoperative from August 1, 2012 to August 29, 2013.10 The

Wind Farm was able to return to production in September 2013, but could only

operate on a ―significantly reduced capacity‖—―approximately sixteen percent of

its prior capacity‖—through January 2014.11 Currently, the Wind Farm is back to

―operating at full capacity, but its contract to supply power is still pending

approval by the Hawaii Public Utilities Commission.‖12

Despite the Wind Farm‘s fires and resulting diminished production capacity,

―in late 2013, MNA began demanding that [Kahuku Holdings] make distributions

to its members‖ pursuant to the Net Cash provision of the Amended LLC

Agreement.13 On December 30, 2013, MNA made a written demand on Kahuku

Holdings for $1,059,550, ―which MNA claimed represented its share of Net Cash

8 Id. ¶ 71. 9 Id.

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Kahuku Holdings, LLC, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/kahuku-holdings-llc-delch-2014.