Category Archives: House Bills 2023

HB1181

HB1181 – Updating planning requirements to improve the State’s climate response.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Duerr (D; 1st District; Bothell) (Co-Sponsors Fitzgibbon, Berry, Peterson, Ryu, and Alvarado – Ds) (By request of the Governor.)
Current status – Passed by both houses. House concurred in Senate’s amendments.
Next step would be – To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB5203 is a companion bill in the Senate.

In the Senate – Passed
Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Local Government, Land Use & Tribal Affairs March 14th, and passed out of committee the 16th. Had a hearing in Ways and Means March 23rd, and passed out of committee April 3rd. Referred to Rules; replaced by a striker on the floor, amended and passed by the Senate April 7th. The floor striker expands the utilities element to include the general location, proposed location, and capacity of all existing and proposed utilities; specifies that a good faith effort to identify all of a public entity’s capital facilities and include the required information about them is enough to shield the plan from claims of noncompliance or invalidity under the GMA; and allows using Commerce’s intermediate guidelines to meet the requirements of the climate change and resiliency elements for periodic updates up to June 2025. The floor amendment adds adopting some existing wildfire risk reduction codes to other options the bill included as ways the land use element might address reducing those risks.

In the House – Passed
Replaced by the sponsor’s substitute and passed out of the House Committee on Local Government January 25th. Had a hearing in Appropriations February 6th. Replaced by a second substitute, changed by three minor amendments, and passed out of committee February 9th. Referred to Rules, replaced by another striker on the floor, amended, and passed by the House March 3rd.
There’s a summary by staff at the beginning of the substitute, listing the changes it made. The changes made by the second substitute in Appropriations are summarized at the beginning of that, and the amendments are included with summaries in the committee’s folder. The minor changes made by the striker are summarized by staff at the end of it.

Summary –
The bill would add a climate change and resiliency goal to the fourteen others that are to guide the development of comprehensive plans, and have that also apply to the countywide planning process and regional transportation planning. The new goal would have planning adapt to and mitigate the effects of a changing climate; support reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and per capita vehicle miles traveled; prepare for climate impact scenarios; foster resiliency to climate impacts and natural hazards; protect and enhance environmental, economic, and human health and safety; and advance environmental justice. The bill would add consideration of climate impacts to shoreline master planning. However, jurisdictions would not be obliged to comply with these amendments until the state had provided funding for that.

It would specify that the land use element of comprehensive plans must give special consideration to achieving environmental justice in its goals and policies, including efforts to avoid creating or worsening environmental health disparities; should consider using approaches that reduce per capita vehicle miles traveled; must reduce and mitigate the risk to lives and property posed by wildfires with measures like reducing residential development pressure in the wildland urban interface area, creating open space buffers between development and wildfire prone landscapes, and protecting existing development through community preparedness and fire adaptation.

It would expand the kinds of transit routes that should have level of service standards to help to achieve environmental justice goals, and expand transportation forecasts to include multimodal and rural demand. It expands language about bicycles and pedestrians to include other forms of active transportation. It would prohibit denying approval to a development that failed to meet traffic level of service standards if its transportation needs might be met through improvements for active transportation, enhanced public transportation, ride-sharing programs, demand management, or other strategies funded by the development.

It would require comprehensive plans to include a climate change and resiliency element designed to reduce overall greenhouse gas emissions, enhance resiliency, and avoid the adverse impacts of climate change. This would have to include efforts to reduce local emissions and avoid creating or worsening local climate impacts on vulnerable populations and overburdened communities. Countries with over 100,000 people or specified densities or growth rates and planning under the Growth Management Act would be required to include a greenhouse gas emissions reduction subelement, and other jurisdictions would be encouraged to. The resiliency subelement would be required for all jurisdictions planning under the GMA and encouraged for others. These required updates would have to be part of the 2024 planning cycle.

The Department of Commerce, in collaboration with various other agencies, would publish guidelines specifying a set of measures counties and cities could take through updates to their comprehensive plans and development regulations that have a demonstrated ability to increase housing capacity within urban growth areas, reduce emissions, or reduce per capita vehicle miles traveled, allowing for consideration of the emissions reductions achieved through the adoption of statewide programs, and prioritizing reductions in overburdened communities. The bill would exempt from SEPA appeals the adoption of ordinances, amendments to comprehensive plans or development regulations, and other nonproject actions taken to implement measures for reducing emissions or per capita miles traveled that were in the department’s guidelines.

The emissions reduction subelement and related development regulations would have to identify the actions the jurisdiction will take, in accordance with Commerce’s guidelines, to:
1) Reduce transportation and land use emissions within the jurisdiction without increasing them elsewhere in the state;
2) Reduce per capita vehicle miles traveled within the jurisdiction without increasing emissions elsewhere in the state; and,
3) Prioritize reductions in overburdened communities to maximize the combined benefits of reduced air pollution and environmental justice.
Actions that weren’t specifically identified in the guidelines could only be considered to be consistent with them if they were projected to achieve reductions in emissions or per capita vehicle miles traveled equivalent to what would be required under the guidelines, and if they were supported by scientifically credible projections. Jurisdictions would not be allowed to restrict population growth or limit population allocation to achieve the requirements. The guidelines could not include road usage charges, or regulations and taxes on transportation service providers, delivery vehicles, or passenger vehicles.

The resiliency subelement would be required to equitably enhance resiliency to climate change in human communities and ecological systems, and avoid or substantially reduce its adverse impacts through goals, policies, and programs consistent with the best available science and scientifically credible climate projections. It would have to prioritize actions in overburdened communities that will disproportionately suffer from environmental impacts and be most impacted by natural hazards due to climate change. Its goals, policies, and programs would have to include those designed to:
1) Identify, protect, and enhance natural areas and areas of vital habitat for safe passage and species migration to foster resiliency to climate impacts;
2) Identify, protect, and enhance community resiliency to impacts, including social, economic, and built factors that support adaptation consistent with environmental justice; and,
3) Address natural hazards created or aggravated by climate change, including sea level rise, landslides, flooding, drought, heat, smoke, wildfire, and other effects of changes to temperature and precipitation.
Jurisdictions might adopt an existing natural hazard mitigation plan by reference if it met the bill’s requirements, or modify one to do that, and might apply to the Department for an extension of the deadlines to do that. In collaboration with tribes and various agencies, the department would develop a model climate change and resiliency element that could be used by jurisdictions in developing the required plans and policies.

The bill includes provisions for public comment on these subelements, for review and approval of them by the department, and for appeals. The bill would add the presence of overburdened communities to the department’s priorities for providing planning assistance, and require it to establish funding levels for grants to community-based organizations to advance participation of vulnerable populations and overburdened communities in planning.

The bill would require the Department of Ecology to update its guidelines to require shoreline master programs to address the impact of sea level rise and increased storm severity on people, property, shoreline natural resources, and the environment. It would require flood control management plans to include consideration of climate change impacts, including the impacts of sea level rise and increased storm severity.

HB1176

HB1176 – Creating a Washington Climate Corps and evaluating climate and energy transition workforce needs.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Slatter (D; 48th District; Seattle) (Co-Sponsor Fitzgibbon – D) (By request of the Governor.)
Current status – Passed out of the Senate Committee on Higher Education and Workforce Development March 15th. Had a hearing in Ways and Means March 21st, and passed out of committee April 3rd. Referred to Rules, and passed by the Senate April12th.
Next step would be – To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB5247 is a companion bill in the Senate.

In the House – Passed
Amended and passed out of the House Committee on Post-Secondary Education and Workforce January 23rd.  Had a hearing in Appropriations February 13th. Replaced by a second substitute and passed out of committee February 21st; referred to Rules and passed by the House March 1st.

Amendments in the House Committee on Post-Secondary Education and Workforce –
There’s a staff summary of the minor changes in Post-Secondary Education at the end of the amendment. The amendment in Appropriations made the program subject to specific appropriations and stated the Legislature’s intent to have it begin in the 2023-25 biennium and expand in the future.

Summary –
The bill would establish a Washington Climate Corps to provide climate-related service opportunities for young adults and veterans, with the objective of building low-carbon and climate-resilient communities and ecosystems while providing education, workforce development, and career pathways to service members. It would be administered by Serve Washington, which also manages the Americorps program, with administrative support from OFM, and would prioritize service in  overburdened communities. It would develop new service opportunities, and establish common requirements for participating service programs. In coordination with a range of stakeholders, it would develop and run a program for Climate Corps members during their service to provide leadership training, foster environmental stewardship and civic engagement, and expose them to climate related professional and educational opportunities. It would administer grants to support equitable access to participation in the Corps, reduce the cost of hosting members for service programs in the network, and support the development of new programs in geographic and topical areas that lack them.

The bill would have the Washington State Workforce Training and Education Coordinating Board establish a clean energy technology advisory committee to evaluate clean energy technology workforce needs and make recommendations to the Governor and Legislature. It would review workforce and business issues in the energy sector and its supply chain, and the impacts of the transition to clean energy on dependent sectors. It would recommend strategies to prevent workforce displacement, support job creation in clean energy technology, and provide support in dealing with workforce changes to businesses and adversely impacted workers. (The bill isn’t explicit, but apparently the Board would select the committee members from all interested parties, but including business and worker representatives from sectors affected by the transition.)

Each biennium, the Board would evaluate the workforce impact of Washington’s climate policies in consultation with the the advisory committee, the Department of Commerce, and Employment Security. It would do a literature review, in addition to its own research, on labor market trends and workforce demand in traditional and clean energy professions; demographics of the sectors; restructuring of jobs and skill sets associated with climate change mitigation policies; the wages and benefits of jobs in clean energy and the skills needed in them, an analysis of how the skills and training of the existing workforce can fill those needs; additional workforce development needs; and challenges that could emerge under multiple future decarbonization scenarios.

It would also make recommendations each biennium for necessary steps to support workforce training for clean energy technology occupations, consulting with postsecondary training partners, and considering the occupational training and skills already covered in existing programs; new skills that could be integrated into those; occupations and skill sets that require developing new programs; and resources needed to deliver training programs and support workers in the transition to clean energy technology.

The board would conduct a study of the feasibility of a program to preserve income and benefits for workers close to retirement who face job loss or transition because of energy technology sector changes. It would report at least every two years to the Governor and committees of the Legislature with recommendations on how the state can support worker and employer needs in response to changing workforce requirements for clean energy technology, including the recommendations of the advisory committee and the Board’s own work.

(The bill would also repeal the legislation establishing several earlier programs about workforce development in green industries.)

HB1175

HB1175 – Creates a state run financial insurance program for owners and operators of underground petroleum storage tanks.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Doglio (D; 22nd District; Olympia) (Co-Sponsor Dye – R) (By request of the Pollution Liability Insurance Agency.)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy & Technology March 22nd. Passed out of committee March 28th and referred to Ways and Means. Had a hearing there March 30th, and passed out of committee April 3rd. Referred to Rules, and passed by the Senate April 11th.
Next step would be –  To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB5233 is a companion bill in the Senate.
There’s a staff report on the bill.

In the House – Passed
Passed out of the House Committee on Environment & Energy January 23rd. Had a hearing in Appropriations on February 1st. Amended to delay the effective date of some provisions to October 2023 and passed out of committee February 8th. Referred to Rules. Amended on the floor to authorize the Pollution Liability Insurance Agency to use any applicable law in trying to recover the expenses of any remedial action covered by the bill, and passed by the House March 16th.

Summary –
The bill would shift from the current State reinsurance program for underground storage tanks, which assumes part of the risk of private insurance companies’ policies, to a program the State runs itself. The Department of Ecology would manage the program, which would cover owners and operators who registered tanks with the department and complied with its eligibility requirements. The program would provide up to $2 million per release for remedial action and for compensating third parties for bodily injury and property damage while the tank was registered, and up to $1 million for remedial action on releases before registration. Compensation would be limited to $3 million a year for releases from a single tank. Ecology would give preference to covering remedial costs, and could prioritize reimbursement based on the threats posed to human health and the environment; whether the people threatened might include a vulnerable population or an overburdened community; and other factors it chose. It would collect an annual fee for the costs of administering the program, which could not exceed $25,000 per participant.

The bill would return the tax on the wholesale value of petroleum products which funds claim payments through the Pollution Liability Insurance Program Trust Account to thirty one-hundredths of one percent from its reduction to half that in 2021. (The tax isn’t collected in a quarter if that account contains more than a set minimum or maximum; the bill doubles those amounts, to keep the account between $15 million and $30 million.) If there were not enough money in that account to pay claims, they’d be prioritized for future payment in the order they were filed, except that any creating an imminent threat to health or the environment would come first.

The bill includes allowing Ecology to assess tanks to determine program or cost eligibility, recover overpayments, and investigate or clean up a release with the owner or operator’s permission. It could deal with releases from tanks that weren’t in the program if they created risks to drinking water or were necessary to protect health and the environment in marginalized, overburdened, and underserved communities; and the owner consented and agreed to repaying the costs.

HB1173

HB1173 – Requires Ecology to create light mitigation standards for wind projects.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Connors (R; 8th District; Tri-Cities) (Co-Sponsor Klicker – R)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy and Technology March 17th. Replaced by a striker and passed out of committee March 28th. Referred to Rules. Replaced by another striker on the floor, amended, and passed by the Senate April 7th. House concurred in Senate’s amendments.
Next step would be – To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Changes in the Senate –
The extensive changes made by the striker are summarized by staff at the end of it. The changes made by the second striker on the floor are summarized by staff at the end of that. The floor amendment limits the requirements to projects with at least five turbines, no longer requires there to be more than one FAA approved technology for a county to adopt a wind energy ordinance, and removes practicability from the criteria for selecting light-mitigating technology.

In the House – Passed
Had a hearing in the House Committee on Environment & Energy January 16th. Replaced by a substitute and passed out of committee February 2nd. Referred to Rules. Replaced by a striker on the floor and passed by the House February 27th.

Substitute –
The substitute now simply requires utility scale wind projects or large turbines with obstruction lights to have aircraft detection lighting systems (or the best available light mitigation if the FAA doesn’t allow those systems). It has Ecology enforce that as a regulation rather than making it a condition of permitting. The striker delays the date for compliance by a year, requires the best “practicable” alternative technology rather than the best “available” technology when detection lighting systems aren’t allowed, and authorizes Ecology to delay enforcing the requirement in various situations.

Summary –
The bill would require Ecology to develop rules to reduce the light pollution from projects, in consultation with DOT and the Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council, and with input from counties and cities. The rules would apply to new and existing projects, and to any aviation obstructions associated with the facility, including meteorological towers of any height. They’d include service and maintenance requirements and safety standards; and they would require sensors to detect approaching aircraft and automatically activate the appropriate lights until they were no longer needed.

HB1166

HB1166 – Creates a water quality trading program to help Clean Water Act permittees meet maximum daily temperature discharge limits. (Dead.)
Prime Sponsor – Representative Dye (R; 9th District; Southeast Washington)
Current status – Had a hearing in the House Committee on Environment & Energy January 16th. Still in committee by cutoff.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Comments –
See also HB1381.

Summary –
The bill would require the Department of Ecology to creates a “watershed-based water quality trading program” in which parties with total maximum daily temperature load limits on discharges contributing to raising the heat of water bodies would be allowed to continue to exceed their local limit by reducing heat contributions elsewhere in the watershed. The Department would be required to offer incentives whenever feasible for improvements made by or on behalf of the permittee in the built environment or that otherwise address the urban heat island effect on waters of the state. (There’s a summary of the permit rules about this issue in the staff report for HB1381.)

Though the bill refers to “urban heat island effects,” I think it’s probably reasonable to assume it’s also a response to the EPA’s 2021’s imposition of total maximum daily load limits for temperature in water discharges to the Columbia and the Snake, in Representative Dye’s part of the state.)

HB1164

HB1164 – Creates a producer responsibility program for appliance refrigerants and insulating foam.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Doglio (D; 22nd District; Olympia) (Co-Sponsor Fitzgibbon )
Current status – Had a hearing in the House Committee on Environment & Energy February 16th. Still there at cutoff.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
The bill would make the parties categorized as producers responsible for creating and funding a stewardship system for dealing with the refrigerants and insulating foam in a wide range of used residential, commercial, and institutional appliances. (It excludes appliances over 1,000 pounds, those that are integral parts of structures, like ice rink refrigeration systems and commercial or multifamily central air conditioning systems, and the air conditioners in vehicles and other mobile applications.) Producers would have to participate in a stewardship organization with a plan to sell covered appliances in the state. The Department of Ecology would implement the program, approve plans, set fees to recover its administrative costs from producers, and enforce the bill’s requirements.

Plans would need to be submitted by 2027 and include methods for achieving the bill’s performance goals; education and outreach plans for retailers and consumers; mechanisms for collecting covered appliances and paying the plan’s financial incentives for turning them in; describe how the program will use consistent best environmental practices in managing pieces of collected appliances; identify brokers, transporters, processors, and facilities to be used by the program; and describe the methods for financing it, including modulating producers’ fees to encourage recycling, resource conservation, the use of low emission refrigerants, and other environmental goals. (The bill exempts an organization’s receipts from its charges for producer members from the B&O tax.) After five years Ecology could require programs that were not meeting performance goals to submit revised plans.

The bill’s performance requirements begin at different levels in 2027 and 2028, between 30% and 75% of the in-state sales for different categories of appliances in baseline years set by Ecology. They increase by 5% a year until they reach 70% to 90%, depending on the category.

Stewardship organizations would have to provide for the free collection of covered appliances directly or at sites, including at least one permanent site in each county. They’d need to provide payments to consumers (in addition to any energy efficiency or utility incentives) that Ecology agreed were sufficient to incentivize the use of the program and to discourage illegal dumping or venting of refrigerants or other pollutants. They’d be required to reimburse local governments for the costs of using a local facility or solid waste handling site as a collection location. Retailers would have to make information provided by organizations about the program available to customers, and could choose to provide collection sites.

There are various reporting requirements, and a provision for maintaining the confidentiality of submitted information. Ecology could take a variety of steps to deal with organizations that were not meeting their obligations, including impose fines of up to $1,000 per violation per day, after a warning, and up to $10,000 per violation per day for the second and each subsequent violation. Appeals would be handled by the Pollution Control Hearings Board.

HB1170

HB1170 – Updating the State’s climate resilience strategy.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Street (D; 37th District; Seattle) (Co-Sponsor Couture – R) (By request of the Department of Ecology)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy and Technology March 10th and passed out of committee March 21st. Had a hearing in Ways and Means March 31st, and passed out of committee April 3rd. Referred to Rules. Amended on the floor to specify that nothing related to developing and updating the strategy creates any new or additional regulatory authority for any agency, and passed by the Senate April 8th. House concurred in Senate’s amendments.
Next step would be – To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB5093 is a companion bill in the Senate.

In the House – Passed
Concluded a hearing in the House Committee on Environment and Energy on January 16th; amended and passed out of committee January 26th. Had a hearing in Appropriations February 6th, amended to shift a deadline by one month and passed out of committee February 9th. Referred to Rules. Amended on the floor and passed by the House February 27th.

House Committee and Floor Amendments –
The committee amendments would require a workgroup on improving the coordination of funding for climate resilience;  require Ecology to estimate agency costs for implementing the updated strategy; report on those  to the Governor and Legislature by September 30, 2024; report every two years on appropriated funding for implementing the strategy. One specifies that agencies can only consider climate change impacts in their policies and programs to that extent that’s allowed under their statutory authority.

The House floor amendment added addressing and prioritizing specified risks and potential adaptive responses to the strategy, and would have the UW Climate Impacts group report on how to best evaluate resilience measures and their cost effectiveness.

Summary –
The bill would have the Department of Ecology update and modernize the 2012 Integrated Climate Response Plan with the assistance of other state agencies. It amends the legislation for creating that plan to include a number of additional agencies, tribal governments, and the UW climate impacts group in the process. (The plan would now be updated every four years, with biannual reporting.) The bill would no longer require Ecology to serve as a “central clearinghouse” for relevant scientific and technical information about the impacts of climate change on the state. It would add explicit requirements for collaboration and engagement with various parties on environmental justice issues. It adds consideration of various time scales to the planning scenarios, and strengthens the language requiring agencies to prioritize climate resilience and adaptation in their planning. The bill would have Ecology recommend a durable structure for coordinating and implementing the state’s climate resilience strategy, including a process for prioritizing and coordinating funding across agencies, and work with OFM and other agencies on coordinating state responses to Federal funding opportunities for climate resilience.

The bill would rewrite and expand the requirements for the plan, dropping several topics, and now including:
(1) A summary of each agency’s current climate resilience priorities, plans, and actions;
(ii) Strategies and actions to address the highest climate vulnerabilities and risks to Washington’s communities and ecosystems;
(iii) A lead agency or group of agencies assigned to implement actions; and
(iv) Key gaps to advancing climate resilience actions, including in state laws, policies, regulations, rules, procedures, and agency technical capacity.

The expanded strategy is supposed to:
(i) Prioritize actions that both reduce greenhouse gas emissions and build climate preparedness;
(ii) Protect the state’s most overburdened communities and vulnerable populations and provide more equitable outcomes;
(iii) Prioritize actions that deploy natural solutions, restore habitat, or reduce stressors that exacerbate climate impacts;
(iv) Prioritize actions that promote and protect human health; and
(v) Consider flexible and adaptive approaches for preparing for uncertain climate impacts.

Ecology would work with other agencies on identifying best practices and processes for prioritizing resilience actions and assessing the effectiveness of potential actions; developing a process for measuring progress and success towards statewide resilience goals; analyzing opportunities and gaps in current agency resilience efforts; and identifying other issues involved in developing policies and actions for the climate resilience strategy.

HB1138

HB1138 – Increasing preparations and funding for drought emergencies.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Chapman (D; 24th District; Port Angeles) (Co-Sponsor Dent – R)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Water, Natural Resources & Parks March 16th. Replaced by a striker restoring the transfer to the emergency drought response account of enough money from the general fund to raise its balance to $3 million when a drought emergency is declared and passed out of committee March 23rd. Had a hearing in Ways and Means March 31st. Passed out of committee April 3rd and referred to Rules. House concurred in Senate amendments.
Next step would be – To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

In the House – Passed
Had a hearing in the House Committee on Agriculture and Natural Resources January 13th; passed out of committee on the 17th. Had a hearing in Appropriations January 6th. Amended to remove both specified transfers of funds and require Ecology to report on expenditures from the drought response account after each emergency; passed out of committee February 9th. Referred to Rules, and passed by the House February 28th.

Summary –
The bill would require transferring $2.5 million from the general fund to the drought preparedness account at the beginning of each biennium, and would allow using the money to plan for droughts as well as to prepare for them. It would allow the Department of Ecology’s grants to public entities to reduce current or future hardship caused by drought conditions to be used for projects even if they were not going to be completed while a drought emergency order was in effect. It would require transferring enough money from the general fund to raise the balance in a new emergency drought response account to $3 million when a drought emergency was declared; the account could only be used to provide relief for the immediate hardship caused by water unavailability. This process would be limited to one transfer in any fiscal year. (The funds could only be spent after appropriation, so I’m not sure when that appropriation for spending in an emergency would be expected to take place.)

The bill would have the chair convene the Joint Legislative Committee on Water Supply During Drought from time to time when a drought advisory was in effect, in addition to when a drought emergency order was, or when the chair determined, in consultation with Ecology, that it was likely such an emergency order would be issued within the next year.

HB1135

HB1135– Authorizing using impact fees for bicycle and pedestrian facilities.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Slatter (D; 48th District; Bellevue) (Co-Sponsor Walen – D)
Current status – Passed out of the House Committee on Local Government January 20th. Referred to Rules.
Next step would be – Action by the Rules Commitee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB5452 is a companion bill in the Senate.

Summary –
The bill would expand the current definition of the public facilities on which impact fees may be spent to include bicycle and pedestrian facilities.

HB1123

HB1123– Authorizing tribes or counties to prohibit local siting of a solar or wind project by passing a resolution saying they would prefer a nuclear plant. (Dead.)
Prime Sponsor – Representative Dye (R; 9th District; Southeast Washington) (Co-Sponsor Klicker – R)
Current status – Still in the House Committee on Environment & Energy at cutoff.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
The bill would prohibit the Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council from recommending the siting of a wind or solar project in a county or “affected tribal area” if the county commissioners or tribal council passed a resolution saying the community or the tribe would prefer the local siting of a nuclear energy facility. (It would also prohibit the Governor from approving an application for certification of a wind or solar energy facility if such a resolution had been passed.)

HB1117

HB1117– Requiring the annual meeting of agencies, utilities and stakeholders to address the extent to which the state risks rolling blackouts and power supply inadequacies.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Mosbrucker (R; 14th District; Goldendale) (Co-Sponsors Dye – R & Leavitt – D)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy and Technology March 17th. Replaced by a striker and passed out of committee March 24th. Referred to Rules, and passed by the Senate April 11th. House concurred in Senate’s amendments.
Next step would be – To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Changes in the Senate –
The striker includes some of the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory’s energy analytics experts in the annual stakeholders’ meetings and requires the conveners to invite them to provide relevant analytics to inform the discussion in 2023 if regional energy analytics capability has been established by the lab.

In the House – Passed
Had a hearing in the House Committee on Environment and Energy  January 12th. Amended to make a couple of minor changes and passed out of committee February 14th. Referred to Rules and passed by the House unanimously March 4th.

Summary –
The law currently requires the UTC and the Department of Commerce to jointly convene a meeting of utilities, grid operators, and other stakeholders at least once a year to discuss power system planning and the adequacy of electric energy resources. The convenors provide a summary of each meeting to the Governor and the Legislature.

The bill would specify that the meeting in 2023 “must specifically address” the extent to which residents are at risk of rolling blackouts and power supply inadequacy events, and the extent to which proposed laws and regulations for building and transportation electrification may require new policy for resource adequacy. Stakeholders would be surveyed for recommendations on policy options to prevent severe blackouts, and the meeting would seek to identify regulatory and statutory incentives to enhance and ensure continuing resource adequacy and reliability.

HB1084

HB1084 – Having the Freight Mobility Strategic Investment Board make project recommendations to the Legislature rather than making grants itself.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Fey (D; 27th District; Tacoma) (Co-Sponsors Ramos, Ryu – Ds)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Transportation March 27th; passed out of committee April 4th and referred to Rules. Passed by the Senate April 12th.
Next step would be – To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

In the House – Passed
Had a hearing in the House Committee on Transportation January 19th. Replaced by a substitute and passed out of committee February 9th. Referred to Rules and passed by the House unanimously on March 7th.

Substitute –
There’s a staff summary of the changes made by the substitute at the beginning of it.

Summary –
Under the bill, the State’s Freight Mobility Strategic Investment Board would no longer be responsible for approving grants for public projects in designated strategic freight corridors. It would make recommendations about grants to the Legislature instead.

The Board would consult with various stakeholders and recommend a six-year investment program for the highest priority freight mobility projects in the state, including priority projects eligible for Federal grant funding for the Infrastructure Act; monitor the implementation of projects included in the program; identify critical emerging freight mobility issues not yet addressed by investments; and report to the Governor and the Legislature on its work by December 2024, and at least every two years after that. The Board would be authorized to provide technical assistance to project sponsors, not just to grant applicants, and to work with stakeholders on developing projects to address critical emerging issues.

The bill would discard the Board’s current rules for prioritizing project grants, and eliminate the current rules for allocating funds among projects, which have the first 55% of the funds go to the highest projects prioritized using criteria the law specifies, and then divide the rest equally among the Puget Sound region, Western Washington, and Eastern Washington. Instead, applicants would have to demonstrate a plan for “sufficient engagement” with overburdened communities impacted by the project, and for evaluation of project alternatives and mitigation measures addressing the impacts on these communities to the greatest extent possible. The Board would adopt other evaluation criteria for the six-year program of investments, including benefits to the state’s freight system, how much funding has already been secured for a project, readiness for construction, and regional distribution of projects. It would recommend appropriate levels of state funding for each project, ensuring funding is allocated to leverage the most partnership funding possible and that projects aren’t more appropriately funded by other sources. It would not recommend projects that appear to improve overall general mobility with limited enhancement for freight mobility.

The Board would be required to contract for a study of best practices for preventing or mitigating the impacts of freight systems in overburdened communities. The bill would add three members to twelve now on the Board – one for the package delivery industry; one for environmental protection interests; and one for overburdened communities. It would have the Department of Transportation coordinate with the Board in developing the periodic updates of the marine ports and navigation plan and the freight mobility plan that are parts of the multimodal transportation plan. It would add stronger environmental justice language and language about the climate benefits of enhanced freight mobility to the current law’s findings.

HB1085

HB1085 – Reducing plastic pollution.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Mena (D; 29th District; Tacoma)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy and Technology on March 10th, and passed out of committee March 21st. Had a hearing in Ways and Means March 31st, and passed out of committee April 3rd. Referred to Rules; passed by the Senate April 8th.
Next step would be – To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

In the House – Passed
Had a hearing in the House Committee on Environment & Energy January 10th; replaced by a substitute and passed out of committee January 26th. Had a hearing in Appropriations February 6th, and passed out February 9th. Referred to Rules, and passed by the House unanimously February 28th.

Substitute –
The substitute made some minor changes in the bill’s details, which are summarized by staff at the beginning of it.

Summary –
The bill would have the building code require a bottle filling station or a combined filling station and drinking fountain in new construction where a drinking fountain is required. It would prohibit the sale or installation of overwater structures containing expanded or extruded plastic foam; and blocks or floats containing that foam and intended for use with such structures. (Floating homes would be exempted.) It would prohibit lodging establishments from providing personal health or beauty products in any single-use plastic packaging. (Enforcement of this requirement would primarily be based on complaints filed with the Department of Ecology, which would be required to create a forum for filing those, and would do education and outreach about the requirement.)

SB5092

SB5092 – Expanding the sales and use tax exemption for plug-in vehicles to include regular hybrids.
Prime Sponsor – Senator King (R; 14th District; Yakima)
Current status – Referred to the Senate Committee on Ways and Means.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
The current sales and use tax exemption applies to new and used cars, light duty trucks, and medium passenger vehicles that are exclusively powered by a clean alternative fuel (ie battery full-electrics and fuel cell vehicles). It also applies to plug-in hybrids that can go at least 30 miles on the battery. The bill would remove the thirty mile requirement. It would add a provision which says that the exemption would also apply to “vehicles that are classified as hybrid electric and gasoline vehicles but not plug-in hybrid vehicles.”

The bill says the exemption would apply to vehicles in the expanded current category “or” vehicles in this new second category. That second category isn’t very clear. It sounds as if it’s excluding plug-in hybrids from the exemption. However, since the expanded current category still clearly includes those, I think the phrase I quoted is just a clumsy way of trying to make it clear that the expanded exemption would also apply to regular hybrids, like the Prius, not just plug-in hybrids.

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.

HB1033

HB1033 – Committee on standards to increase composting of food waste and reduce contaminants in compost.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Walen (D; 48th District; Kirkland)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy and Technology March 10th, amended to add a representative from a regulated company providing curbside pickup to the advisory committee, and passed out March 21st. Referred to Rules, and passed by the Senate April 12th. House concurred in Senate’s amendments.
Next step would be – To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

In the House – Passed
Had a hearing in the House Committee on Environment & Energy January 10th; replaced by a substitute and passed out of committee January 26th. Referred to Rules, and passed by the House February 28th.

Substitute –
The substitute adds a representative of hospitality businesses to the stakeholder committee, allows interested tribes to participate through invitations from Ecology, and adds home composting to the list of things for the committee to consider.

Summary –
The bill would create a stakeholder advisory committee to make recommendations to the Legislature on standards to divert increased amounts of food waste from landfills to composting facilities and to reduce the inclusion of non-compostable materials.

The committee would consider:
(a) The goals of managing organic materials to increase food waste diversion and to ensure that finished compost is clean;
(b) The types of compostable products, and amounts if known, sold or distributed into Washington;
(c) Consumer confusion caused by noncompostable products that can lead to contamination issues;
(d) Compostable standards related to the breakdown of products in facilities;
(e) The acceptance of compostable products by organic materials management facilities in Washington, including consideration of organic certifications;
(f) Estimates of the percentage of compostable products used in Washington that are disposed of at organic materials management facilities;
(g) Financial incentives for organic materials management facilities accepting compostable products;
(h) Current laws related to compostable products and the enforcement of these laws;
(i) Any work product from other stakeholder advisory committees currently discussing similar topics in other jurisdictions or nationwide; and
(j) Policy options addressing contamination of organic waste streams and ways to increase the use of reusable and refillable items.

The committee members would be selected by Ecology and include at least one member from:
(a) Cities, including both small and large cities and cities located in urban and rural counties, which may be represented by an association that represents cities in Washington;
(b) Counties, including both small and large counties and urban and rural counties, which may be represented by an association that represents county solid waste managers in Washington;
(c) Municipal collectors, or companies providing curbside organic materials collection services or curbside organic materials management services under a municipal contract;
(d) Three organic materials management facility operators, including at least one operator of a facility that doesn’t currently accept compostable food service products and one operator of a facility that does currently accept them;
(e) An environmental nonprofit organization specializing in waste and recycling issues;
(f) Two manufacturers of compostable products, including at least one manufacturer of compostable food service products and one manufacturer of compostable plastic food service products;
(g) A distributor of compostable food service products;
(h) A statewide general business trade association;
(i) A retail grocery association;
(j) Two organizations that act as third-party certifiers of compostable products;
(k) The Department of Agriculture; and
(l) Two associations focused on organic materials recycling or composting.

An independent facilitator hired by the Department of Ecology would convene the committee, hire any needed subcontractors, provide staff support to the committee, prepare reports for its review, and deliver a report to appropriate legislative committees with its consensus recommendations on developing standards for managing compostable products, especially food service products. (The report’s to include the dissenting opinions on issues on which there wasn’t consensus.)

HB1018

HB1018 – Adds ten years to the tax exemption for hog fuel used for electricity, steam, heat or biofuel.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Tharinger (D; 24th District; NW Olympic Peninsula) (Co-Sponsors Chapman & Fey – Ds; Orcutt & Abbarno – Rs)
Current status – Had a hearing in Senate Ways and Means March 23rd; passed out of committee April 4th and referred to Rules. Passed by the Senate April 19th.
Next step would be – To the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB5030 is a companion bill in the Senate.

Comments –
The same proposal was introduced by Representative Chapman in 2021 as HB1387, but did not get a hearing. It passed the House last year as HB1924, under Representative Tharinger’s sponsorship.

In the House –
Passed out of the House Finance Committee  January 19th. Referred to Rules, and passed by the House unanimously March 16th.

Summary –
The bill would extend the current sales and use tax exemptions for hog fuel used to produce electricity, steam, heat, or biofuel for ten years, until June 2034. (The bill declares the policy objective of the exemption is to increase the ability of beneficiary facilities to provide at least 75 percent of their employees with medical and dental insurance and a retirement plan, but this is not a requirement. It’s only to be used by the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Committee in evaluating the effectiveness of the exemption.)

JLARC reviewed a previous exemption in 2019. It estimated that the exemption would save the sixteen participating facilities $5.6 million over the 2021-2023 biennium. Employment had only gone down by 281 jobs between 2013 and 2017, from 5,139 jobs to 4,858, so that exemption easily met the stated policy goal of retaining at least 75% of the jobs.

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.