Category Archives: All Bills 2024

HB1391

HB1391 – Creating a state-wide building energy upgrade assistance program.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Ramel (D; 40th District; Anacortes and San Juans) (Co-sponsors Doglio, Duerr, Berry, Pollet, Reed – Ds)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy and Technology March 22nd and 24th.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

In the House – Passed
Completed a continued hearing in the House Committee on Environment and Energy January 31st. Replaced by a substitute by the prime sponsor and passed out of committee February 9th. Referred to Appropriations, had a hearing there February 21st, was replaced by a second substitute, amended, and passed out of committee February 23rd. Referred to Rules, and passed by the House February 28th.

Substitute –
There’s a staff summary of the changes made by the substitute at the beginning of it. The second substitute specified that the program would have to include resources for renters and that its energy efficiency projects did not have to include weatherization; the amendment would make the bill null and void if it wasn’t funded in the budget.

Summary –
The bill would authorize the Department of Ecology to create a statewide building energy upgrade navigator program, in collaboration with the WSU Energy Office. The program would provide a statewide resource to assist building owners with electrification services and energy efficiency services and with funding for those, as well as providing other assistance in the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, job creation, business opportunities, and workforce development in the sector. By March 1st, 2024, Ecology would be obliged to contract with an administrator or administrators, selected through a competitive process, to implement the program. Contracts could not be for more than five years, and would have to include sufficient performance metrics to let the department and the Legislature evaluate the program’s energy savings, greenhouse gas emissions reductions, consumer cost savings, wage and employment impacts, and customer satisfaction. The bill would convene a technical advisory group including a representative from each of a list of stakeholders to provide ongoing guidance to the program, including recommendations on continuously improving and growing it, addressing any gaps in its design and implementation, addressing split incentives, and incorporating the Department of Health’s environmental health disparities mapping tool into its work. The advisory group would provide an annual report on the program’s progress to the Legislature.

The program would have to provide outreach and deliver energy services to owner-occupied and rental residences, commercial buildings under 20,000 square feet; and single and multifamily dwellings. It would support energy efficient and emissions reductions alternatives for all types of fuel, and strive to cover all regions of the state. It would prioritize services to low-income households, vulnerable populations, and overburdened communities, including tribal communities, having considered recommendations of the UTC’s natural gas decarbonization study. It might dedicate some of its funding for these services. It would support accessible administration of programs authorized under the Inflation Reduction Act, and the integrated implementation of all relevant clean buildings programs funded by the state budget, including several currently described in the 2023 House Omnibus Appropriations Bills. It would implement a process in coordination with the Office of Minority and Women’s Business Enterprises to help customers find qualified energy contractors, including considering whether they met the program’s labor standards and reporting requirements.

The program’s outreach to customers would have to include creating and maintaining updated educational and marketing materials, including advice about all relevant funds and
financial assistance available from Federal, State, local, and energy utility programs. (It would be required to focus on this outreach about funding first.) It would also provide assistance with performing energy audits to provide recommendations to customers on a wide range of cost-effective energy and health improvements, including weatherization, appliance upgrades, electrification, smart meters, solar photovoltaic panels and other on-site sources of renewable energy, electric vehicle charging; and smart thermostats. It would provide community outreach in collaboration with Ecology’s programs to reach and serve underserved communities.

The program’s energy services for customers would have to include help in finding qualified contractors to implement audit recommendations; recommendations for programs that customers might be eligible for based on their income, and assistance with securing financing. Program administrators would have to develop community workforce agreements between labor representatives and contractors for the work performed on projects funded by the program, considering the size and complexity of projects, number of trades and crafts anticipated to be used, the availability of trained and skilled workers, and the location of projects. Any community workforce agreement would have to establish goals for labor hours or percentages of work to be performed by underrepresented groups, by local residents, and by state registered apprentices. They’d have to specify that workers performing work on projects under a community workforce agreement were paid a wage rate that was at least equivalent to the prevailing wage rate of workers, laborers, or mechanics in the same trade or occupation in the locality in which the work was being performed.

The program would also identify statewide workforce and contractor training needs and develop training. It might directly administer incentives and rebates for programs when directed to do that by Ecology, but would not provide any financial or technical assistance for projects including installation of new fossil fuel appliances. The administrator might develop a database portal to identify and track the locations of services provided, customer interactions, and performance metrics for completed work.

Ecology would provide a report on the program to the Legislature every other year, covering the implementation of the navigator program and community workforce agreements. It would include details on the monetary, greenhouse gas, and energy savings achieved; the savings to investment ratio achieved for customers; the wage levels of jobs created; the utilization of state registered preapprentice and apprenticeship programs; the efficiency and speed of delivery of services; and the public health benefits, including indoor and outdoor air quality improvements and increased access to cooling for climate resilience. It would also have to include recommendations for additional energy efficiency, electrification, and distributed energy programs for customers to maximize deployment of energy efficiency services, and to achieve higher rates of penetration and economies of scale through implementing multiple measures simultaneously.

HB1433

HB1433 – Adopting a standard method for use in programs for the energy labeling of existing residential buildings.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Duerr (D; 1st District; Bothell) (Co-Sponsors Ramel, Fitzgibbon, Berry, Reed, and Doglio – Ds)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy and Technology March 22nd and March 24th. 2nd Substitute returned to the House Committee on Environment and Energy for the 2024 Session. Amended to make labeling a local option and remove the licensing of home energy assessors; passed out of committee January 18th. Referred to Rules.
Next step would be – Action by the Rules Committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

In the House 2024 – Passed
There’s a staff summary of the changes made in the Energy & Environment.

In the House 2023 – Passed
Had a hearing in the House Committee on Environment & Energy January 24th; replaced by a substitute and passed out of committee February 2nd. Referred to Appropriations, and had a hearing there February 13th. Replaced by a second substitute and passed out of Appropriations February 21st. Referred to Rules and passed by the House March 1st.

Substitutes –
This extended various deadlines by a year or eighteen months and specified that score reports to Commerce wouldn’t include the addresses of individual residences or the owner’s names. The second substitute in Appropriations made a few minor changes, and removed the language specifying that nothing in the bill prohibited jurisdictions requiring HERS scores at time of sale, or prohibiting requiring them as a condition for receiving efficiency incentives from Commerce.

Summary –
The bill would require the Department of Commerce to create rules for using the US Department of Energy’s Home Energy Scores as the primary system for assigning residential buildings scores evaluating their energy efficiency. (These DOE scores are based on an assessment of the building’s characteristics by a trained and certified rater, rather than on the energy used by its current occupants.) Cities and counties could promote or administer home energy score programs, require a score when a residential building is advertised for sale; or require a score to be eligible for Commerce’s financial incentives for efficiency improvements, but the bill itself wouldn’t require buildings to have scores.

The report on a building would have to include its home energy score, on a relative scale of one to 10, with 10 being best; its energy use per year by fuel type; the unit prices for each fuel used to calculate energy costs;  the kilowatt hours per year of renewable energy it generated, if there were any; the annual cost of energy by fuel type and altogether; and its estimated current carbon emissions in tons/per year, which  would have to be shown on a  graphic scale from zero to 15 so a reader could visualize how a building compared to the worst and best possible greenhouse gas outcomes.

The report would also have to include itemized recommendations for priority energy saving improvements that had an expected payback of 10 years or less, as well as for additional improvements. (Recommendations might include upgrades to windows, and wall, roof, attic, and floor insulation.) The report would estimate the home energy score and the expected annual reduction in energy bills after itemized priority improvements were completed. (Reports would also include the building’s floor area, address, and year of construction; the date of the assessment; the assessor’s name, contact information, license number, and employer; a statement indicating that the report met Washington state standards for energy score assessments; and other energy efficiency and green building certifications for which the building had qualified.)

The Department of Licensing would create requirements for licensing home energy assessors by December 31st, 2023, and they would have to be licensed by the next September. (I’m not sure whether the bill’s language would require someone doing assessments using some other system to have a license or not.) The requirements for a license would include standards for training, including provisions for recognizing training provided by other organizations, as well as standards of professional conduct, practice, and ethics.

HB1368

HB1368 – Requiring and funding purchases of zero-emission school buses after September 2035.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Senn (D; 41st District; Mercer Island) (Co-Sponsors Fey, Berry, Doglio, Peterson, Chapman, Fosse, Slatter, Gregerson, Callan, Lekanoff, Ramel, Stonier, Street, Santos, Fitzgibbon, and Berg – Ds)
Current status – Referred to the House Committee on Education. Redirected to the House Committee on Environment & Energy; had a hearing there February 7th. Replaced by a substitute and passed out of committee February 14th. Referred to Appropriations, and died there. Reintroduced in 2024, and had another hearing in House Appropriations on January 11th. Replaced by another substitute and passed out of committee January 29th. Referred to Rules.
Next step would be – Action by the Rules Committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB5431 is a companion bill in the Senate.

Substitutes –
The 2023 substitute changed the requirement to purchasing 70% zero-emission buses by 2030 and all zero-emission buses by 2033, as well as specifying environmental justice priorities and making some other minor changes which are summarized by staff at the beginning of it. The folder with materials for the 2024 executive session has the next substitute and there’s a staff summary of the next changes at the beginning of that.

Summary –
The bill would require purchasing zero-emission school buses after September 1, 2035. It would create a grant program using any specifically appropriated funding to support school districts, charter schools, and state-tribal education compact schools purchasing them, and to support purchasing and installing charging stations and associated infrastructure and equipment. To be eligible for grants, buses powered by fossil fuels would have be at the end of their depreciation schedule and eligible for replacement under the current state law about reimbursing districts for the cost of student transportation vehicles. Grants for buses would not be allowed to exceed the purchase price minus any salvage value of the bus being replaced.

There would be a competitive application process, prioritizing grants that provided the greatest reduction in greenhouse gas emissions for the amount of state support, and considering expected improvements in health equity for communities of color and low-income communities; and the age of applicants’ fleets. OSPI would also be allowed to consider other factors such as air quality improvements in areas with high traffic congestion. (At the time of an award, a grantee would have to have enough charging infrastructure in place to operate the replacement bus; or have secured enough funding in addition to the grant to purchase and install that.) OSPI would also publish an annual list of Federal grant opportunities pertinent to replacing nonzero emission school buses.

HB1283

HB1283 –Requiring some ESG reporting and increased ESG investment options in the State’s retirement system.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Duerr (D; 11th District; Bothell) (Co-Sponsor Berry, Ramel, Macri, Doglio, Reed, and Pollet- Ds)
Current status – Referred to the House Appropriations Committee in 2023. Died in committee; reintroduced there in 2024.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
The bill would require the State’s Investment Board to report on the climate-related financial risk, the social responsibility, and the establishment and use of proxy voting and corporate governance policies in its private and public portfolios by January 1st 2024, and every three years after that. By 2024, it would have to provide at least three investment options consistent with its environmental, social, and governance policies for individuals participating in self-directed funds. (The options would reflect a range of policy preferences and investment objectives consistent with those ESG concerns to the extent that was consistent with the Board’s fiduciary responsibilities.)

HB1185

HB1185 – Updating and expanding the state’s producer stewardship program for lighting products.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Hackney (D; 11th District; Renton & Tukwila) (Co-Sponsors Duerr, Berry, Ramel, Fitzgibbon, Doglio, and Pollet – Ds)
Current status – Had a hearing in the House Committee on Environment and Energy  January 23rd. Replaced by a substitute and passed out of committee February 16th. Died in Rules 2023. Returned to the House Committee on Environment and Energy for the 2024 Session. Had a hearing January 18th. Replaced by a 2nd substitute and passed out of committee January 25th. Referred to Rules.
Next step would be – Action by the Rules Committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Substitute –
The substitute in 2023 prohibited disposing of lights in most solid waste and recycling containers, and made some other small changes that are summarized by staff at the beginning of it. In the folder with materials for the executive session, there’s a staff summary of the changes made by the substitute in 2024 at the beginning of it; they mostly dealt with lights containing mercury.

Summary –
The bill would prohibit the sale of lights containing mercury starting in 2026, with some exceptions for special purpose lights, and create penalties for violations. It would expand the current product stewardship program for lights containing mercury to include the end of life management of most lights by the same date.

The producers of lights for sale in the state would have to continue to manage and fund the current product stewardship program, expanded to cover collecting, transporting, reuse, recycling, processing and final disposition of all types of lights, including the special purpose ones containing mercury which could still be sold. The bill would eliminate the environmental handling charge which is currently added to the price of lamps containing mercury to fund the program; it would be directly funded by the producers. (However, they still wouldn’t be responsible for the costs of curbside or mail-back collection programs, except for transporting and processing the lights from those. They would still have to fund and manage free collection sites and pay for the transportation and processing of lights from those.

At least 90% of the state’s residents would have to have a permanent collection site within 15 miles, and an additional site would be required for every 30,000 residents in urban areas. The program would have to provide reasonable opportunities for people in rural areas farther from the required sites to drop off unwanted lights at collection events. The bill specifies additional requirements for outreach and consumer education about the expended program, including a survey about public awareness of it at least every five years. It adds specifications about the safe handling of lights containing mercury, and specifies that plans have to prioritize recycling of other materials to the extent that’s practicable. It would now require programs to include contingency plans to keep providing services if a stewardship organization stopped.

Stewardship programs would be required to design their charges to producers to encourage the use of recycled content and discourage the use of undesirable materials. They’d have to reimburse local governments for the costs when a local government facility or solid waste handling facility served as a collection location. The bill also adds provisions for Ecology’s review and approval of stewardship organization’ plans, and revises Ecology’s procedures for dealing with violations to adjust them to the expanded system. It drops the current law’s provisions for reporting on the availability and purchasing of energy efficient lights in the state.

HB1078

HB1078– Requires local urban forestry ordinances to include a tree bank provision for replacing trees, in order to avoid blocking development that involves removing them.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Duerr (D; 1st District; Bothell) (Co-Sponsor – Doglio – D)
Current status – Had a hearing in the House Committee on Local Government January 11th; replaced by a substitute, amended and passed out of committee February 3rd. Died in Appropriations in 2023. Reintroduced there in 2024; had a hearing on January 25th.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Substitute –
There’s a staff summary of the changes made by the substitute at the beginning of it. (It dropped requirements for providing tree bank provisions as an option, and made other minor changes; the amendment simply revised language in the findings.)

Summary –
Tree banks are designated areas where trees can be planted to compensate for the removal of trees elsewhere in order to enable development. The tree bank provisions required in local urban forestry plans would have to conform to guidelines established by the Department of Natural Resources. Those would create criteria for designating areas to be used as tree banks. (They would have to be located in priority areas the Department identified using canopy analysis and inventories, mapping tools that identify highly impacted communities, data on habitat for salmon recovery, and DNR’s 20 year forest health strategic plan.)

The required guidelines would include the appropriate ratios of trees planted within the tree bank to trees removed elsewhere within the community; the appropriate species of trees to be used; and how to effectively support urban forest management plans through the use of a tree bank.

HB1012

HB1012 – Creating an extreme weather response grant program.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Leavitt (D; 28th District; SW Pierce County) (Co-Sponsor Rep. Robertson – R)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on State Government & Elections March 14th and passed out of committee March 24th. Had a hearing in Ways and Means March 31st. Reintroduced in the House for the 2024 Session, sent to Rules, and passed by the House on January 8th. Referred to the Senate Committee on State Government & Elections, and scheduled for a hearing there at 1:30 PM on Tuesday January 30th.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

In the House  2024 – Passed

In the House  2023 – Passed
Passed out of the House Committee on Innovation, Community & Economic Development, & Veterans January 13th ; had a hearing in Appropriations on January 30th. Amended and passed out of committee February 16th. Referred to Rules, and passed by the House February 28th.

Changes in Appropriations –
The amendment would narrow eligibility for the grants to areas where populations face “combined, multiple environmental harms and health impacts”,  and widen the definition of the people they might be used to benefit from those who are “socially vulnerable” to those who are “vulnerable” more generally.

Summary –
Subject to appropriation, the bill would have the State Military Department create a grant program to help cities, counties and towns that have emergency management organizations, and tribes, meet the costs of responding to community needs during periods of extremely hot or cold weather or in periods with severe poor air quality from wildfire smoke. Recipients would have to demonstrate that they lacked the local resources to address these needs and that the costs were incurred for the benefit of vulnerable populations.

Grants could be awarded for establishing and operating warming and cooling centers, as well as transporting people and their pets to them, and providing facilities for pets in them; purchasing fans or other supplies for cooling congregate living settings; providing emergency temporary housing such as rented hotel rooms; and other activities the department determined were necessary for life safety during these periods.