Summary of significant accounting policies (Tables)

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2014

Accounting Policies [Abstract]

Schedule of earnings per share basic and diluted under two-class method

Under the two-class method, HEI's EPS was comprised as follows for both participating securities and unrestricted common stock:

	2014				2013				2012
	Basic		Diluted		Basic		Diluted		Basic		Diluted
Distributed earnings	$	1.24	$	1.24	$	1.24	$	1.24	$	1.24	$	1.24
Undistributed earnings	0.41		0.40		0.39		0.38		0.19		0.18
	$	1.65	$	1.64	$	1.63	$	1.62	$	1.43	$	1.42