Climate News
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Climate News
State
Retirements coming up. Biggest one Jay Inslee, which gives us a race for the Governorships, currently with front-runners Attorney-General Bob Ferguson (D) and former Congressional Representive Dave Reichert (R), as well as Sen. Mark Mullet, a conservative Democratic state senator. Senate Majority Leader Andy Billig of Spokane is retiring. Senate Pro Tempore Karen Keiser is retiring. With Mark Mullet running for Governor, his state senate seat in Issaquah is open. Sen. Sam Hunt, the chair of the State Government & Elections Committee, is retiring, which could change the outlook for voting reforms, and Jessica Bateman, who has been very active in housing, will run for his seat. Kevin Van De Wege, chair of the Senate Agriculture, Water, Natural Resources & Parks Committee is running for Lands Commissioner, which leaves his seat open. Frank Chopp, former state Speaker of the House and representative from the 43rd is retiring. Shaun Scott, who ran a strong race on the left in D4 in 2019 has announced that he will run for that spot. House Minority Leader, J.T. Wilcox is also retiring. There are also a number of Senate leaders who don't need to stand for election this year, but are running for other offices. With all of these seats changing, we should expect changes next year.
Climate News 3.16.24
Seattle
The draft Comprehensive Plan contains a Climate Element, which is what the City is using to replace the Climate Action Plan. The Climate Element starts on page 137. It affirms the City's 2030 and 2050 goals for overall emission reductions, and for transportation notes: "But Seattle is not yet on track to meet our 2030 emissions reduction goals. More aggressive change is needed across the transportation sector."
Also of note: the City does not expect that the Comprehensive Plan will be passed in 2024, as called for by State law, but believes it will be passed in Q1 of 2025. This was briefed to the City Council by OPCD and the Mayor's office.
The City released a 2023 Progress Report on the One Seattle Transportation and Climate Executive Order from 2022. The report notes the following:
On low-pollution neighborhoods: The City of Seattle received a $1.2 million grant by the U.S. Department of Transportation to plan for low-pollution neighborhoods that will reduce transportation emissions in our communities. The grant funding will be used to establish a vision for low-pollution neighborhoods, develop a toolkit, identify potential project areas, and define projects and programs for an implementation and funding plan.
The Executive Order specifically said that the "community conversation" they would hold in 2023 would inform the investments made in the Transportation Levy.
The City released a Curbside Climate Plan, and a zero-emission freight plan. The progress report says that this will inform "potential projects in 2024 to encourage e-cargo bike delivery in Seattle."
The Progress Report says that the City, in consultation with the Utilities and Transportation Commission, Transportation Network Companies (TNC) (e.g. Uber, Lyft) and taxi companies, developed a proposal in that sets a path for TNC and car-share vehicles operating in Seattle to transition to zero-emission by 2030. This proposal has apparently not yet been made public.
The City released the Climate Change Response Framework, which lays out a plan for reducing emissions by mode shifting and vehicle electrification.
The City is working on electrifying its own fleet: "There are over nine ongoing pilot programs including street sweepers, forklifts, semi-trucks, and more that the team is being trained on and testing, while also looking to bring permanently into the City’s fleet infrastructure. In addition, SDOT is making investments in charging infrastructure, electrical updates, and department implementation strategies. More will be rolled out in 2024."
The Progress Report notes that in the Comprehensive Plan "OPCD and SDOT shall explore expanding “complete communities” where most daily needs are met through short trips under 3 miles by walking, biking, or taking transit."
On electrification, it reports that "Seattle City Light led an interdepartmental team consisting of SDOT, SDCI, and OSE to prepare for EV adoption by streamlining the process for the installation of EV charging infrastructure. This report is completed and outlines several recommendations for the City to adopt."
Editorial note: before the Executive Order, the City also released in 2022 a Transit Performance Policy for allocating bus-only lanes.
From the SDOT Transit Performance Policy
State
Ecology released the results of the latest Cap & Invest auction: "all of the 7.4 million current vintage allowances sold at a settlement price of $25.76", for a total of $62.5 million. This is significantly lower than the high of Q3 2023, $63.03. Clean & Prosperous Washington created a chart showing relative allowance costs over time for a number of different carbon markets, and argues that they are all more expensive at first and then settle into an expected value. They note: "the price decline is not wholly unexpected: It is within the range that we have witnessed in other prominent Cap-and-Invest programs." Other observers believe polluters are under-buying in the hope that the CCA will be voted down.
Elsewhere
The Rhodium Group reported that US GHG emissions fell in 2023 by 1.9%. This is not much, but it is notable because at the same time the economy as a whole grew by 2.4%. US emissions are now 17.2% below 2005 levels. The report cited a mild winter, as well as decreasing coal for power generation. "If emissions had continued to decline at the same rate as 2011-2019 instead of the pandemic-induced turmoil of 2020-2022, emissions would be about 2% higher today than we’re estimating them to be—suggesting at least a modest acceleration in the pace of decarbonization." The report notes that although this is a step in the right direction, we would have to more than triple the rate of decline, and sustain it for every year from now to 2030 to meet the Paris Agreement goals of 50-52% reduction by 2030.
Climate News 3.11.24
Seattle
The Mayor released the draft Comprehensive Plan. Most commentators seem to agree that the plan tilts towards more townhomes, but this may not be enough to accomodate much additional growth. The Urbanist quotes Julia Reed "The largest city in the state should be maximizing the use of the tools [the Washington State Legislature] is providing them, not doing the minimum.” The Office of Community Development and Planning is doing a series of six open houses around the city to talk to residents, see below for details. For some coverage, see KUOW, the Urbanist, Hacks & Wonks (21:38). OPCD will present the plan to Council later today @ 2:25 pm.
Loyal Heights Community Center, March 14 @ 6pm
Cleveland High School, March 19 @ 6pm
Nathan Hale High School, March 26 @ 6pm
Chief Sealth International High School, April 3 @ 6pm
Garfield Community Center, April 16 @ 6pm
Eckstein Middle School, April 25 @ 6pm
City Hall, April 30 @ 6pm
Virtual, May 2 @ 6pm
State
The Legislative Session is now over. All the bills which were awaiting reconciliation got it. But there is a fair amount of controversy over what happened with HB 1589, the PSE Decarbonization bill, and now there is an action from the Sierra Club: No PSE handout at ratepayers' expense! to ask the Governor to make a selective veto.
The Dept of Commerce just released a study on residential building decarbonization. The Executive Summary is here, the complete report is here. This was a study that some Seattle building decarbonization advocates had argued for and got in the budget in 2021.
Elsewhere
The Legislature just voted to allow networked geo-thermal heating pilots in Washington. In Massachusetts, a pilot project is currently in progress, and expects to go online later this spring. A gas company there is trying out the idea of replacing gas lines in a neighborhood with ground source heat pumps powered by electricity. The utility will still supply heating, just using electricity.
And, informally, this headline recently caught my eye: UN Climate Chief's Blunt Message: Fewer Loopholes, Way More Cash to Really Halt Climate Change. He was talking about the developed countries passing stronger rules and paying for decarbonization elsewhere, but it applies equally well at home.
Climate News 3.2.24
Seattle
The Mayor released the Seattle Transportation Plan, which will be presented to the Transportation Committee on Tuesday morning. See here for an overview. The new plan comes in two parts. Part One outlines the vision, describes the engagement, and has at the end a long list of possible capital projects. Part Two is a Technical Report that goes over what used to be all the different plans (Bicycle Plan, Transit Plan, etc.) and lays out the criteria for prioritizing the different goals for different contexts.
The Mayor released the Equitable Development Zoning, Part 2, aka Connected Communities (The Urbanist). It is now before the Land Use Committee. The proposal would set up zoning incentives for projects that set aside 30% of units as affordable and partner with community-based organizations. At most 35 projects would be built under this pilot program. Representatives from affordable housing groups and some climate groups were in support, some tree advocates came out in opposition
State
The Legislative Session ends next week. What remains is finalizing the budget bills, and reconciling the bills that passed both chambers but were amended differently in the two houses. One person I heard from said that overall it seemed like a much less ambitious year, partly because of the short session, but also because of uncertainty over upcoming elections, open positions like the Governorship, and some prominent people retiring. So, here's hoping the elections go well because there's a lot riding on it.
Following is a quick summary of bills, for a more complete look see here.
These bills all passed and are awaiting the Governor's signature:
SB 5973, Condo owners have a right to install heat pumps
HB 2156, Solar consumer protections
HB 1976, Larger incentives for upgrading buildings
SB 6283, Extend Connecting Communities program for multi-modal paths
These bills have passed both chambers but require reconciliation:
SB 6058, Link WA's carbon allowances market with California & Quebec
HB 1368, Electric School Buses
HB 1589, PSE Decarbonization
HB 1282, Buy Clean, Buy Fair
HB 1998, Legalize co-housing (e.g., apodments)
HB 2131, Networked geothermal heat pumps pilot projects enabled (Avista has a pilot in the works)
And, these bills missed the cutoff and are no longer in consideration:
The State Dept of Commerce released a Priority Climate Action Plan. The plan was funded by a grant from the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for helping states, tribes and metropolitan areas to develop comprehensive climate plans. The Puget Sound Clean Air Agency will be doing the work for the Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue area which includes all cities in the four county region. The EPA requires that all PCAPs include a GHG Inventory, quantified GHG reduction measures, a Low Income and Disadvantaged Communities Benefits Analysis, as well as a review of authority to implement each measure. There will be a state-wide Comprehensive Climate Plan that follows in the summer of 2025, and a follow up status report in 2027.
Climate News 2.27.24
Seattle
Mayor Harrell gave the State of the City address (KUOW). In it, he made these points relevant to climate:
On transportation, he will be focused on fixing potholes, maintaining bridges, addressing climate with more roadway trees and electrification, and building sidewalks.
On climate, he cited the passage of the Building Emissions Performance Standards and said they would focus this year on reducing household emissions, including accelerating the Clean Heat Program to install more heat pumps in lower income homes.
On the budget, the Mayor plans to close the $250M budget gap with budget cuts, not new revenue. "While there are some who would suggest the answer lies in new revenue, the fact is that passing a new or expanding tax would not address the fundamental issues needed to close this gap in the long run," Harrell said.
Sound Transit
Sound Transit has ordered 33 double-decker electric buses with inductive wireless recharging for the Stride Bus Rapid Transit that will run from Renton to Lynnwood along I-405. The buses are scheduled for delivery in 2026.
State
The State Legislature has just passed the cutoff date for bills to have passed the fiscal committee in the opposite chamber. All remaining bills must pass through Rules, have a floor vote, and possibly be reconciled. The session ends March 7. Here's the status of some of the climate-related bills:
Passed both chambers, still need reconciliation:
HB 1998, Legalize co-housing. Allows housing with shared kitchens and optionally also shared bathrooms wherever a 6-plex is allowed. Washington State Standard has more details.
Waiting on a floor vote:
HB 1589, PSE Decarbonization. Directs Puget Sound Energy and the State Utility Trade Commission to set up a plan for transitioning PSE's gas customers to electricity.
In Rules Committee:
SB 5931, Salmon-safe tires. Ecology to recommend policies to reduce the impact of the chemical 6PPD from tires on salmon
HB 6015, Reduce Parking Minimums. Reforms the rules on what counts as a parking space for the purposes of minimum parking requirements.
HB 1433, Home Energy Score. Allows local cities to require home sellers to provide efficiency information for the home.
HB 2131, Geo-network pilots. Allows pilot projects of networked ground source heat pumps for home heating.
HB 1368, Electric School Buses. Funding for zero-emission school buses.
HB 1282, Buy Clean Buy Fair. Enables the State to prefer clean materials and fair labor practices on public projects.
SB 6058, CCA Linkage. Combine Washington's emissions allowance market with California and Quebec.
SB 6092, Emission reporting requirements for big business. Require big businesses doing business in Washington to report their emissions.
These bills are looking dead now (failed since the previous report):
Transit Oriented Development
Rent Stabilization
Heat Pump Navigator
Managing Refrigerants in Appliances
ReWRAP Act
Reducing GHG from anesthetics & pesticides
Jaywalking reform
Clean Schools Program
Bottle Bills
Elsewhere
Colorado introduced bills that would improve air quality. One would increase penalties for repeated violations. Another would extend the ozone season for two extra months; this would limit activities, such as oil and gas exploration, that would increase ozone. And the Colorado Dept of Transportation would be required to come up with ways to reduce vehicle miles traveled. The bills are meant to improve air quality in the Denver Metro area, south to almost Colorado Springs and north to the Colorado-Wyoming line north of Fort Collins and Greeley.
The Atlantic reported on two studies on the effects of air pollution. In the first report. economists report that the recession of 2007-2009 increased life expectancies in the US. "Out of every 25 Americans age 55, for instance, one appears to have received an extra year of life. On average, across all age groups, the recession reduced the American mortality rate by 2.3 percent." The recession was only 2 years long, but the longer life expectancy lasted 10 years.. If you use standard accounting for the value of the longer life expectancy, it turns out that the recession paid for itself, "What Americans lost in income and purchasing power, they gained in life-years"; the value of the extra time to live was about the same as the reduction in earnings.
Climate News 2.7.24
Seattle
House Our Neighbors announced that it would run a campaign for a new initiative for social housing. The previous initiative set up the administration of the social housing, this one will be to fund the housing. The initiative would apply a 5% payroll tax on companies who have employees making more than $1M per year, and could raise $50M per year, starting in 2025. This could be enough to pay for 2000 additional units of new social housing over 10 years. House Our Neighbors will have 180 days to gather 26,521 valid signatures to qualify for the November ballot.
The Seattle Transportation Plan and Levy are expected to be released sometime in Feb., and will have 4 weeks of public review, after which it is expected to go to council in April. The Transportation Levy needs to be passed this summer in order to get on the ballot for Nov. The City has planned to meet its decarbonization goals for 2030 mainly by vehicle electrification and mode shift, and one thing to evaluate for the Transportation Levy is whether the planned investments will be enough to get the level of mode shift that we need.
The draft Comprehensive Plan is now many months delayed, but expected in Feb or March.
State
Legislators are holding Town Halls, see here for a schedule. Usually the legislators give a recap of how things are going, sometimes will discuss for things that failed why they failed. It is a great chance to ask questions about climate bills, even just bringing the topic up shows the legislator that people care about it. It can be a simple matter of asking what has been done on climate, or it can be any specific climate concern you have.
The Legislative Session just passed its fiscal cutoff, and the next deadline is Feb 13 for when bills must have passed their House of Origin, or be Necessary To Implement the Budget. Below see the status of some of the big climate bills, here's a link to see many others. Click the tab on the bottom to show Dead Bills.
These bills have passed their Chamber of Origin, and move on to the opposite chamber:
HB 1589, PSE Decarbonization
SB 6256, Solar Consumer Protection
SB 6278, Promoting Organic Agriculture
SB 5931, Salmon Safe Tires
These bills have been scheduled for a floor vote:
HB 2131, Allow networked geo-thermal heating
HB 1391, Heat Pump Navigator
HB 1433, Home Energy Score
HB 1368, Electric School Buses
All other bills that are still under consideration are in their chamber's Rules Committee. The Rules Committee in each chamber schedules bills for floor votes.
These bills failed to advance and are no longer under consideration:
HB 2070, Curb Act
SB 6052, Oil Pricing Transparency
HB 1283, Require ESG Reporting and Options in State Pension Plan
HJR 4210, Green Amendment
Elsewhere
The Biden Administration announced that they would postpone making a decision on new LNG export terminals until it can more thoroughly study the effect on the climate and on the American public. This is a major win for the climate, as the new terminals would be a natural gas mega-project and have been described as a "climate bomb". For more info on this, there's a new podcast from Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins with more background information.
A report from UC-Boulder concluded that Biden's climate platform may have been pivotal in winning the 2020 election (paper). "We find that climate change opinion has had a significant and growing effect on voting that favors the Democrats and is large enough to be pivotal to the outcomes of close elections. We project that climate change opinion probably cost Republicans the 2020 presidential election, all else being equal."
Climate News 1.24.23
Seattle
The City Council appointed Tanya Woo to fill Theresa Mosqueda's at large position on the Council. Tanya Woo will chair the Committee on Sustainability, City Light, and Culture, which is a key committee for those interested in climate. Here's a summary from her on her priorities for Seattle; she doesn't say much about climate directly, but is in favor of increased traffic safety and more public transit service.
King County
The County released a 2023 Biennial update to the Strategic Climate Action Plan. It notes: "The most recent GHG inventory for King County showed that emissions increased to 27.1 million metric tons of CO2 equivalent (MTCO2e) by 11 percent compared to 2007. Per-capita GHG emissions have declined over time 7 percent and 23 percent in 2019 and 2020, respectively, compared to the 2007 baseline year. The most substantial drivers for an increase in emissions were population growth, higher GHG emissions from electricity provided by Puget Sound Energy, and increased aviation emissions. Increased efficiency of passenger vehicles (decreased emissions per mile) was the largest contributor to decreasing emissions." The report also has a useful graphic illustrating the need for further local action on climate, and another one that shows how much reductions result from each policy. The grey & black areas represent changes we still need to make, and the light green are reductions we will need from aviation & marine transport.
State
The Legislative Session is in full swing, since it's a short session, time is going by quickly. The first deadline for bills to pass their policy committee in the Chamber of Origin (either House or Senate) is coming up next week, Jan 31. Bills that haven't gotten the approval of their policy committee by then will be "dead" for this year, although they can be reintroduced in the next year. Here's a quick recap of some (but certainly not all!) of the climate-related bills:
HB 1589 passed the House, and moves on to the Senate. This is the Gas Utility Decarbonization bill that would ensure that Puget Sound Energy plans for the transition to clean energy, makes significant new programs available to help folks transition off of fossil gas, and creates opportunities for low-income customers to access the clean energy transition.
Two other buildings-related bills are in the House Rules Committee, the last step before a floor vote. They are the Heat Pump Portal, which would provide a website for helping connect homewoners to rebates for electrification and efficiency improvements, and the Home Energy Score, which would inform potential house buyers how efficient potential homes are, and thus also give more of an incentive to current homeowners to make energy efficiency improvements. Buy Clean and Buy Fair, which addresses embodied carbon in state-funded projects, is also in House Rules. And Sightline's bill to make it possible for utilities to provide ground-source heat pumps (SB 6039) has moved to the Senate Ways & Means Committee.
The ReWRAP Act (HB 2049) and the Bottle Bill have advanced to the fiscal committee. The ReWRAP Act would expand recycling access across the state, reduce recycling confusion by creating one list of what can and can’t be recycled across the state, and improve recycling outcomes by making companies that make decisions about packaging financially responsible for the end of life costs of those materials. The bottle bill would create beverage container recycling program similar to Oregon's.
I-2117, an initiative to repeal the Climate Commitment Act, has been certified for the ballot. The Legislature has the option to adopt the initiative, to let it go to the voters as is, or to submit an alternative that will appear on the ballot together with the initiative. This is one of six initiatives backed by Republicans, the others, not yet certified, would repeal the capital gains tax, roll back the police vehicular pursuit law, give parents a "bill of rights" to review their children's curriculum, let people opt out of long term care insurance, and block state and local governments from enacting income taxes.
Climate News 1.3.24
Seattle
The new City Council had its first meeting on Jan 3 (Crosscut). They elected Sara Nelson as Council President. They will be accepting applications for a replacement for Theresa Mosqueda through Jan 9. They made the following committee assignments:
Land Use – Tammy Morales
Finance, Native Communities and Tribal – Dan Strauss
Sustainability, City Light and Arts & Culture – Theresa Mosqueda's replacement
Transportation – Rob Saka
Parks, Public Utilities and Technology – Joy Hollingsworth
Governance, Accountability and Economic Development – Sara Nelson
Libraries, Education and Neighborhoods – Maritza Rivera
Housing and Human Services – Cathy Moore
Public Safety – Bob Kettle
Here are some things we can expect over the next year from city government:
January
Council elects a replacement for Theresa Mosqueda
OPCD releases the Draft Comprehensive Plan. This is already about 7 months late.
Council files work plans for what each committee expects to do during the year
June
OSE begins rule making for the Building Emissions Performance Standards
Council approves a Transportation Levy proposal to go on the November ballot
November
Election for city-wide councilmember to for the remainder of the term (just one year), replaces the temporary appointment Council will make now
Election also for the next Transportation Levy, to replace Move Seattle levy
Council passes a new two year budget for 2025 and 2026
December
Council passes a new Comprehensive Plan, including a Climate Element
Sound Transit
Julie Timm, CEO of Sound Transit has resigned, and will be paid one year's severance pay while she is on retainer to provide consultations. It is not clear why she is leaving, but it seems likely that there were differences with the Board, which is mostly made up of elected officials from counties and cities within the Sound Transit service area. Sound Transit will be starting a search for a new CEO. In the meantime, the technical advisory board has voiced concerns that problems they have pointed out remain, and that important management oversight roles, beyond that of CEO, still need to be filled.
State
Northwest Natural, a gas company that serves 2.5 million people in northwest Washington, has been offering builders $2000 to install gas in appliances and hook ups in new homes. This is according to The Guardian: Revealed: US utility firms offer builders cash and trips to fit new homes with gas appliances. The article points out: "The longstanding relationship between gas interests and the building sector could be a major impediment to decarbonizing buildings, which account for roughly one-third of US greenhouse gas emissions."
The State's Legislative Session starts on Jan. 8 and runs through March 7.
Note: if you would like to weigh in on climate legislation during the Legislative Session, a great way is to subscribe to 350 Washington's Civic Action Team, which sends out twice weekly updates on legislation with quick actions you can take to influence the outcome. Another great resource is Climate At the Legislature.