Category Archives: Transportation

HB2955

HB2955 – Gives a $30 rebate on the registration fee for hybrid or alternative fuel vehicles that were driven less than 6,000 miles in the previous year.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Shewmake (D; 29th District; Tacoma) (Co-sponsors Paul, Macri, Ramel, Young, and Fitzgibbon)
Current status – Referred to the House Committee on Transportation.
Next step would be – I’m not sure. This may be NTIB, in which case I guess it could still move this session…
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
Would give a $30 rebate on the annual registration fee for a hybrid or alternative fuel vehicle if it had been driven less than 6,000 miles in the previous year.

HB2957

HB2957 – Regulating indirect sources under the Clean Air Act and reducing building emissions.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Fitzgibbon (D; 34th District; Seattle)
Current status – Introduced in the House Committee on Appropriations March 2nd and scheduled for a hearing and executive session the same afternoon at 1:30 PM. An amended substitute passed out of committee (at 1:50 AM…); referred to Rules.
Next step would be – Action by the Rules Committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Comments – There’s a staff bill analysis available.

The substitute’s additional definition of “indirect emissions” for the purposes of the act restricts them to emissions from “fuels” ; it also adds what seems like a vague and inadequate definition of “leakage”. It allows the Department of Ecology to get additional data from producers and distributors if that’s needed to calculate the indirect emissions it’s authorized to regulate. It rewrites the section on credits for biofuels to improve the prose, without changing the substance as far as I can see. It now specifies the energy-intensive and trade-exposed facilities that the Department can treat with special consideration, to the extent needed to prevent leakage, by using a list of industry classification codes. (It also specifies that the special consideration does not extend to their products.) The amendment adds an additional preemption, prohibiting local air authorities, cities and counties from adopting a clean fuels standard or low carbon fuel standard until January 1, 2023, if Ecology adopts a clean fuels standard or low carbon fuel standard by January 1, 2021.

Summary –
The bill responds to the recent Supreme Court decision holding that Ecology didn’t have the statutory authority to regulate fossil fuel production and distribution through the Clean Air Act because that didn’t authorize it to regulate indirect emissions. The bill revises the definitions of emissions to specify both direct and indirect ones, and explicitly authorizes Ecology and local air authorities to use the Act to regulate the emissions from the production and distribution of any product in the state emitting over 25,000 tonnes a year of greenhouse gases, and of all fossil fuels.

It requires Ecology to adopt a rule, taking effect after October 1, 2021, that specifies emission thresholds for regulated sources. It authorizes Ecology to collect fees to cover the administrative costs of the program, to rely on market-based mechanisms including bankable tradeable credits to achieve emission reductions, and to provide special consideration for energy-intensive and trade-exposed industries, but only to the extent necessary to address leakage. Ecology is to provide biofuels with credits that adjust their obligations to take account of the difference between their lifecycle emissions and those of whatever fossil fuels they’re expected to replace. If it regulates direct or indirect emissions sources other than fossil fuels, it has to provide a mechanism for using credits or offsets from forest carbon sequestration in meeting those obligations.

The bill directs the Utilities and Transportation Commission to allow timely recovery of prudent and reasonable compliance costs by utilities.

It would delay implementing the 2018 residential energy code until July 1, 2022, if the Legislature provided policies and funding for existing residential retrofit programs that produced larger greenhouse gas emissions reductions.

It prohibits any local caps, taxes or fees on greenhouse gas emissions, and any local restrictions on natural gas infrastructure in new buildings until 2023.

It would make the new Clean Air Act authority null and void if a more comprehensive program that put a price on greenhouse gas emissions and was forecast to achieve the State’s targets were enacted.

SB6684

SB6684 – Code requirements for EV ready charging infrastructure in additional buildings.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Das (D; 47th District; Kent) (Co-Sponsors Saldaña, Nguyen, Hobbs, and Lovelett)
Current status – Referred to the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy & Technology.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Comments –
State law currently requires EV ready charging infrastructure for five percent of the parking spaces in new hotels and motels, and in Group B and Group R-2 buildings. The bill would expand that to require more spaces, and to cover single family residences and some other residential buildings.

Summary –
The bill requires the Building Code Council to add rules requiring a 40 Amp circuit and the wiring to make it easy to add 240 volt Level 2 chargers for new buildings in group B (which includes office buildings and ones containing professional or service businesses); in hotels and motels; in group R-2 (which includes buildings with sleeping units or more than two dwelling units that have primarily permanent occupants); and in group R-3 (which includes single family residences and some other residential buildings like boarding houses).

This infrastructure for at least one charger is to be provided in private parking for an individual dwelling. In multi-family buildings with one to six surface parking spaces, each space is to have it. If there are seven to twenty-five surface spaces, at least six must be ready for chargers. If there are more surface spaces, and in parking garages serving multi-family residences, and in all other residential uses twenty percent of the spaces must be EV ready. Ten percent of the spaces in non-residential uses have to be EV ready. If accessible parking is also provided, at least one of the accessible spaces has to be ready for charger installation.

The Council has to allow limited reductions in the number of required spaces or provide exemptions if there’s substantial evidence that the added electrical load would require on-property power transformation on the utility’s side of the meter, or would require upgrading the existing residential service.

SB6659

SB6659 – Minimum requirements for testing autonomous vehicles in the Department of Transportation’s pilot program.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Das (D; 47th District; Kent) (Co-sponsors Randall, Lovelett, Nguyen, Keiser, C. Wilson, Frockt, and Saldaña)
Current status – Referred to the Senate Committee on Transportation.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
HB2676 is a companion bill in the House.

Summary –
The bill requires an insurance policy covering at least five million dollars per occurrence for bodily injury, death, or property damage for vehicles being tested under the Department of Transportation’s autonomous vehicle self-certification testing pilot program.

Organizations testing autonomous vehicles have to provide the Department with contact information, the local jurisdictions where testing is planned, the vehicle identification numbers, and proof of an insurance policy that meets the requirements. They must notify the department about any traffic incidents and any traffic infractions involving an autonomous motor vehicle within ten days, and about any disengagements of the autonomous driving system system that are made to avoid a possible traffic incident. The information has to include whether the autonomous driving system was operating the vehicle at the time of or immediately before the traffic incident or infraction, and details about any traffic incidents including any loss of life, injury, or property damage that resulted from them.

The bill authorizes the Department to charge a fee to cover the program’s administrative costs, and the Department’s to provide an annual update to the Legislature’s transportation committees summarizing the reported information.

HB2918

HB2918 – Insurance requirements for peer-to-peer car sharing businesses.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Corry (R; 14th District; Yakima, Klickitat and Skamania counties)
Current status – Referred to the House Committee on Consumer Protection and Business.
Next step would be – A striker for HB2773 replaced the language of that bill with this one’s.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Comments –
As I read the bill, the car sharing company is not made liable for damage to the shared car itself; it may provide coverage for that, but is not required to.

(HB2773 is another bill on the subject, dealing with the same issues with some differences in language and detail which may matter to lawyers. ) It’s now been replaced by a striker that substituted the language of this bill for its original text.

Summary –
The bill makes a peer-to-peer car sharing company liable for bodily injury, or property damage to third parties, or uninsured and underinsured motorist or personal injury protection losses during the period when an owner’s car is being used by another driver, and when it’s being delivered to that driver. It’s liable for the amount stated in the car sharing agreement, which must at least satisfy the State’s minimum insurance coverage requirements. However, it’s not liable if the owner makes an intentional or fraudulent material misrepresentation or omission to the company before the car sharing period in which the loss occurred; or is acting in concert with a driver who fails to return the vehicle according to the terms of the agreement. (There’s a provision I don’t understand which says the company is liable for these damages “notwithstanding the definition of car sharing termination time” provided in the bill.)

Companies are required to ensure that there is insurance coverage, at least at the levels the State requires, for the owner and the driver, and that it recognizes that the vehicle will be used in a peer-to-peer sharing program or doesn’t exclude that. (The coverage may be provided by the owner, the driver, the company, or some combination of those. I think that Section 4(7)(b) means that the company is not required to provide any coverage, only to ensure that there is the minimum.) If the company is providing all or part of the required insurance it assumes the primary liability if there’s a dispute about who was in control of the car at the time the loss occurred or it’s failed to provide required information about liability coverage to the driver or driver, but it’s to be indemnified by the owner’s insurance company if it’s determined that the owner was in control of the car at the time of the loss. The car sharing company is also required to provide the minimum coverage if the driver or owner doesn’t have insurance that provides it, and to notify owners with liens on their cars that allowing them to be shared through the program may violate the terms of the lien. If an insurance company chooses to defend or indemnify a claim against an owner or a driver for a loss while a car was being shared, and the company’s policy excluded that coverage, it can seek reimbursement from the car sharing company’s insurer.

Insurance companies may exclude any and all coverage for vehicles used in peer-to-peer sharing programs. Car sharing companies are required to keep records on the times cars were used, the fees paid by drivers, and the revenues received by owners for at least the length of the applicable personal injury statute of limitations.

Car sharing agreements have to inform the owner and the driver that they’re potentially liable for any economic loss that violating the terms and conditions of the agreement causes the company, and that their car insurance policies will not cover those. They have to inform them that the company’s insurance may not cover them if the car is shared past the termination time in the agreement, that owner’s liability insurance may not provide coverage for a shared vehicle, and if there are conditions under which the driver has to have a policy providing primary coverage with certain limits to book a shared vehicle. The agreement also has to provide the daily rate, fees, any applicable insurance or protection package costs that are charged to the owner or the driver, and an emergency telephone number for roadside assistance and other customer service.

Companies can only enter sharing agreements with legally authorized drivers. They’re responsible for any equipment they install in the car, and can’t charge an owner if it’s stolen, unless the owner caused that; if a driver damages or loses their equipment, they can try to recover for that loss. They must verify that there are no outstanding safety recalls on cars registering for the program, and notify owners that if they receive new recalls they’re responsible for taking cars out of the program until the problem’s been fixed.

SB6597

SB6597 – Allows triple trailer rigs on State highways.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Sheldon (D, 35th District, Mason County) (Senator Sheldon caucuses with the Republicans.)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Transportation January 28th.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
HB2692 is a companion bill in the House.

Comments –
The EPA has a flyer about combination freight vehicles that estimates turnpike double and triple trailers reduce fuel use by 21%. (Some studies also suggest they’re involved in fewer accidents, though that may reflect other factors, like their getting better drivers at this point.)

Summary –
Currently, the law prohibits operating any semi with a trailer longer than fifty-three or with two trailers longer than sixty-one feet on state highways. (It exempts empty double trailers or semitrailers weighing less than 26,000 pounds if they’re part of the inventory of a manufacturer, distributor, or dealer, and the entire rig is less than eighty-two feet.)

The bill requires the Department of Transportation to implement rules allowing semis with three trailers to operate on designated State highways; the rules may include other operating conditions the Department specifies to ensure a safe and efficient highway system. (This is dependent on federal approval of a variance to the freeze of state law imposed by the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act of 1991, so presumably DOT also has to apply for the variance.)

The Department is also to produce an annual status and performance report on the volume of triple trailer traffic, and the segments of the trucking industry taking advantage of the variance; and on their impacts on highway safety, traffic movement, and the environment.

SB6586

SB6586 – Imposes a per mile fee on electric and hybrid vehicles.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Saldaña (D; 37th District; Seattle) (Co-Sponsors Hobbs, Liias, and Conway)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Transportation January 29th. Substitute by the prime sponsor passed out of committee February 10; referred to Rules.
Next step would be – Action by the Rules Committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Comments –
The proposal would charge an plug in car owner driving an average amount, say 11,000 miles, $385 a year if they only drove on electricity, plus the gas tax on any fuel they used when they weren’t relying on the battery. It would charge a hybrid owner $220 a year plus the regular gas tax.

The substitute leaves the fees to be specified in future legislation, or according to the recommendations in the plan if the Legislature doesn’t do that. It adds options for variable rates to the items the plan’s to cover, and extends the fee to State light vehicles. The plan would no longer have the Transportation Commission serve in a policy role that ensures independent oversight, reporting to the Legislature, and appropriate public input; it leaves the Department of Transportation as the lead agency in charge of administering and operating the system. (It’s not clear from the language whether this is only during a transition plan, while the bill leaves the ultimate long term role of the Commission open, or if this is to be ongoing…)

Transportation Choices has a flyer about road use charges.

Summary –
Starting January 1st 2024, the bill would charge plug-in vehicles that can go thirty miles or more on the battery three and a half cents per mile, and other hybrids two cents a mile, in addition to other fees and taxes. The proceeds would have to be used for road preservation and maintenance.

By December 1, 2021, the Department of Transportation and the Transportation Commission would develop a plan for imposing the fee, incorporating the ongoing work of the Commission evaluating road usage charges. It would have to include:
(a) Different mileage reporting options;
(b) Recommended methods and rates for achieving cost efficiency, fairness, minimal administrative cost, payment compliance, consumer choice, and preserving individual privacy;
(c) Alternatives to allow for monthly or quarterly payment;
(d) Any recommended statutory changes, including suggested offsets or rebates to recognize other taxes and fees paid by electric and hybrid vehicle owners;
(e) Recommendations to align the system better with other vehicle charges and to establish a potential framework for broader implementation of a per mile funding system, including analysis of the preferred method for addressing Eighteenth Amendment considerations; and
(f) A recommended implementation and governance structure under which the Department would operate the system, but the Commission would ensure independent oversight, appropriate public input, and report to the Legislature.

SB6398

SB6398 – Expands transportation policy goals; requires evaluating projects using performance metrics for the goals before the Legislature considers them.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Saldana (D; 37th District; Seattle)
Current status – Scheduled for a hearing in the Senate Committee on Transportation January 28th at 3:30 PM.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
HB2688 is a companion bill in the House.

Summary –
The bill revises and expands the current list of policy goals for the State’s transportation system. Under the bill, public investments in transportation would be supposed to support the achievement of:

(a) Accessibility: To improve affordable access to the places and goods Washington residents, organizations, and businesses need to live, work, study, play, and pray;
(b) Safety: To provide for and improve the safety and security of transportation users, the transportation system, and anyone interacting with the system;
(c) Environment and climate: To enhance the quality of life through transportation investments that reduce greenhouse gas emissions, air pollution, water pollution, and toxics, promote energy conservation, and protect lands and waterways;
(d) Health and resilience: To promote healthy people and communities through pollution-free transportation, multimodal transportation, integrated land use and transportation projects, clean active transportation, and appropriate infrastructure;
(e) Equity and environmental justice: To eliminate historic and persistent barriers and prioritize investments meeting the goals in this section for highly impacted communities and vulnerable populations, which includes direct inclusion in decision making;
(f) Preservation: To maintain, preserve, and extend the life and utility of prior transportation systems and service investments that meet current and future needs and goals; and
(g) Economic vitality: To promote and develop transportation systems that support and enhance affordability, access to opportunity, and good jobs.

(These changes drop a section on increasing mobility and reducing congestion; add the sections about accessibility, health and resilience, and equity and environmental justice; and revise the language of the other sections in a variety of ways, placing more emphasis on progressive goals like affordability, good jobs, and reducing greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution.)

The bill also requires projects and any reductions in projects to be evaluated on specified performance metrics for each of these goals, and to meet a performance threshold to be established by the Department of Transportation, before their inclusion in a budget authorization or their consideration by the Legislature. The evaluation process is to include representatives from the active transportation division, the public transportation division, the multimodal planning division, and the ferries, in conjunction with the Department of Ecology, the Interagency Council on Health Disparities, the Department of Health and the Department of Commerce, and is to include a public input process that is inclusive of vulnerable populations in highly impacted communities, as identified by the department of Health. The analysis is to be published on the Department’s website.

There are several pages of metrics which you can find on the last pages of the bill.

HB2773

HB2773 – Regulations for peer to peer vehicle sharing programs.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Kirby (D; 29th District; Tacoma) (Co-sponsor Vick)
Current status – Failed to pass out of committee by cutoff.
In the House – (Passed)
Had a hearing in the House Committee on Consumer Protection & Business February 5th. Replaced by a striker which substituted the language of HB2918 for this bill’s, and passed out of committee February 7th; referred to Rules. Passed the House nearly unanimously February 19th.

In the Senate –
Referred to the Senate Committee on Financial Institutions, Economic Development & Trade; had a hearing February 25th.
Next step would be – Dead bill…
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Comments –
HB2918 was another bill on the subject, dealing with the same issues with some differences in language and detail which may matter to lawyers. This bill had some additional provisions which are summarized here at the end, below the asterisks.

This bill has now been replaced by the language of HB2918. The staff note at the bottom of the striker doing that, which is currently available in the folder with the materials for the committee meeting, discusses the new bill as if it merely made a few adjustments to the State’s current law governing P2P car sharing, which seems to be RCW 48.175. However, I don’t see that cited in either of these bills, or in the staff report for the original HB2773, and I don’t see why the staff says that… so I can’t offer much help about what’s really going on here.

Summary –
The bill makes a program connecting peer-to-peer vehicle owners with people driving their cars assume the full liability of a car owner for any bodily injury or property damage to third parties, uninsured and underinsured motorist benefits, and personal injury losses during the sharing period in the amount stated in an agreement. (That may not be less than those set forth in chapter 46.29 RCW, which I think means at least twenty-five thousand dollars for bodily injury or death of one person in an accident, fifty thousand dollars for bodily injury or death of two or more people, and ten thousand dollars for property damage.) The program is liable even if its insurance has lapsed or it doesn’t have coverage. It’s not liable if there’s been a serious misrepresentation or omission by the car’s owner before the trip in which the accident occurred or if the owner acts in concert with a driver who fails to return the vehicle in accordance with the agreement.

Companies are required to ensure that there is primary liability coverage, at least at the minimum levels the State requires, for the owner and the driver, and that the insurance recognizes that the vehicle will be used in a peer-to-peer sharing program or doesn’t exclude that. (The coverage may be provided by the owner, the driver, the company, or some combination of those. I think that Section 7 means that the company is not required to provide any coverage, only to ensure that there is the minimum.) If the company is providing all or part of the required insurance it assumes the primary liability if there’s a dispute about who was in control of the car at the time the loss occurred or it’s failed to provide required information about liability coverage to the driver or driver, but it’s to be indemnified by the owner’s insurance company if it’s determined that the owner was in control of the car at the time of the loss. The car sharing company is also required to provide the primary minimum coverage if the driver or owner was supposed to, but actually doesn’t have insurance that provides it.

The company has to notify owners with liens on their cars, when they first register and again “prior to the time the owner makes the vehicle available for use”, that allowing a car to be shared may violate the terms of the lien. If an insurance company chooses to defend or indemnify a claim against an owner or a driver for a loss while a car was being shared, and the company’s policy excluded that coverage, it can seek reimbursement from the car sharing company’s insurer.

Insurance companies’ liability policies may exclude any and all coverage for vehicles, including those used in peer-to-peer sharing programs. Car sharing companies are required to keep records on the times cars were used, the fees paid by drivers, and the revenues received by owners for at least the length of the applicable personal injury statute of limitations.

*****

This bill includes car-sharing agreements as transactions covered by the State’s consumer protection act, unless a violation is the result of false, misleading, or inaccurate information provided to the company by an owner or driver. It specifies the conditions for delivery of notices and disclosures for master or member agreements for peer-to-peer car sharing companies and any other rental car companies that may provide cars to drivers in similar ways, without a visit to a retail service location, executing an agreement, or giving the customer the terms and conditions at the time of service. In these situations, companies do not have to physically compare a driver’s license and the driver if they have previously verified that the customer is a licensed driver and requires documentation that verifies the customer’s identity before they take possession of the vehicle.

The bill allows airports to require rental car companies or car sharing companies providing cars parked on airport property, or used for (or advertised as being available for) trips to or from the airport to sign contracts with reasonable standards, regulations, procedures, and fees.

HB2692

HB2756 – Allows triple trailer rigs on State highways.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Doglio (D, 22nd District, Olympia)
Current status – Referred to the House Committee on Transportation.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB6597 is a companion bill in the Senate.

HB2748

HB2748 – Requires relatively large employers providing a parking subsidy to offer a cash out option.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Ramel (D; 40th District; Bellingham)
Current status – Passed the House Committee on Labor & Workplace Standards January 30th. Referred to Rules. Failed to pass out of the House by cutoff.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Comments –
In a parking cash out an employer offers a cash allowance to an employee as an alternative to the subsidy they’d otherwise get to provide the employee with parking. For what it’s worth, the findings say, “According to some studies, parking cash out programs tend to reduce driving to work by twenty percent or more.”

Summary –
The bill requires employers with fifty or more employees in the state that provide a parking subsidy to offer a cash out option to the employees who get it. The subsidy’s set at the difference between what it would cost the employer to provide a parking space and what, if anything, the employee would pay for it.

A program may require employees who choose the cash option to certify that they’ll comply with guidelines designed to avoid neighborhood parking problems, with a provision that employees who don’t comply with the guidelines will no longer be eligible for it.

The bill exempts employers who are easing parking and would have to pay penalties if they reduced the number of spaces.

SB6335

SB6335 – Adding proportional greenhouse emissions reductions and resiliency to growth management planning.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Salomon (D; 32nd District; Shoreline)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Local Government January 21st. Failed to make it out of committee by 2020 cutoff; dead bill.
Next step would be –
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
HB2609 is a companion bill in the House.

Comments –
The first section of this bill, which adds addressing climate change to goals for regional planning processes, and is summarized in the first paragraph below, is identical to all of Senator Salomon’s SB6453.

Summary –
The Growth Management Act currently lists fourteen goals that are supposed to guide the development and adoption of comprehensive plans and development regulations for cities and counties planning with that framework. The bill adds a fifteenth, which says that they’re supposed to ensure that their own comprehensive plans and development regulations, and the regional policies, plans, and strategies for their countywide planning framework (under RCW 36.70A.210) and for their regional transportation planning (under RCW 47.80) “adapt to and mitigate the effects of a changing climate; support state greenhouse gas emission reduction requirements and state vehicle miles traveled goals; build resilient infrastructure; and nurture environmental, economic, and human health.”

This bill adds a new climate change and natural hazards resiliency element to comprehensive planning under the GMA for the following counties and cities within those counties – counties west of the crest of the Cascades that OFM estimates had more than 100,000 residents in 2019, and counties east of the crest with an estimated population of more than 500,000 residents; counties east of the crest with an estimated population of more than 200,000 residents in 2019 and an unincorporated population of less than 40,000; and counties east of the crest with an estimated population of more than 90,000 residents and an unincorporated population of less than 15,000.

The Department of Commerce, in consultation with several other agencies, is to develop an baseline estimate from 2017 data of the share of the State’s transportation and land use greenhouse gas emissions from those emissions in the regions in which multiple counties subject to the act plan together through formal structures, and for each remaining city and county. Then the Department is to calculate the proportional share of reductions that each county or multicounty region would need to acheive for the state to reach its 2035 and 2050 emissions reductions targets.

The new element must be designed:
(a) To result in reductions in greenhouse gas emissions generated by the transportation and land use systems within the planning jurisdiction consistent with that share of the State’s targeted reductions: and
(b) To result in reductions in per capita vehicle miles traveled consistent with the state transportation policy goals (in RCW 47.01.440); and
(c) To avoid, and build resiliency to, the worst impacts of climate change on people, property, and ecological systems through specific actions consistent with the best available science that institute adaptation or resiliency measures. (These may include actions designed to address natural hazards created or aggravated by climate change, including sea level rise, landslides, flooding, drought, heat, smoke, wildfire, and other effects of reasonably anticipated changes to temperature and precipitation.

This new part of the plans must be finalized no later than two years before the comprehensive plan review and revision deadlines specified in RCW 36.70A.130. Other jurisdictions are encouraged to develop a climate change and natural hazards resiliency element in their planning, whether or not they’re doing it under the GMA.

As part of its technical assistance program, the Department of Commerce is to develop a model climate change and natural hazards resiliency plan element that may be used by counties, cities, and multiple county planning regions for developing and implementing climate change and natural hazards resiliency plans and policies. Counties and cities that adopt this element are to treated as in compliance with the GMA’s requirements until January 1st, 2029. A review and update of comprehensive plans must take place by June 30th 2025. If they occur before June 30th, 2029, adoption of the model plan element, development regulations in accordance with it, changes in countywide policies in accordance with it that affect the fiscal impact analysis required by the GMA, and the adoption of a regional emissions and vehicle miles reduction plan by a regional transportation planning organization to address the reductions required by the new element are not subject to appeal. (The comprehensive plan of each county or city would now be required to be consistent with these regional transportation plans.)

Regional transportation organizations including at least one jurisdiction the act applies to would be required to adopt a regional emission and vehicle miles reduction plan addressing all their member jurisdictions implementing the goals for reducing annual per capita vehicle miles traveled; and reducing aggregate greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation sector according to the share of reductions assigned to them by the Department of Commerce.

HB2609

HB2609 – Adding proportional greenhouse emissions reductions and resiliency to growth management planning.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Duerr (D; 1st District; Bothell)
Current status – Scheduled for a hearing in the House Committee on Environment and Energy January 28th at 3:30.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB6335 is a companion bill in the Senate.

The new element must be designed
(a) To result in reductions in greenhouse gas emissions generated by the transportation and land use systems within the planning jurisdiction consistent with that share of the State’s targeted reductions: and
(b) To result in reductions in per capita vehicle miles traveled consistent with the state transportation policy goals (in RCW 47.01.440); and
(c) To avoid, and build resiliency to, the worst impacts of climate change on people, property, and ecological systems through specific actions consistent with the best available science that institute adaptation or resiliency measures. (These may include actions designed to address natural hazards created or aggravated by climate change, including sea level rise, landslides, flooding, drought, heat, smoke, wildfire, and other effects of reasonably anticipated changes to temperature and precipitation.

HB2676

HB2676 – Minimum requirements for testing autonomous vehicles in the Department of Transportation’s pilot program.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Kloba (D; 1st District; Bothell) (Co-sponsors Boehnke, and Hudgins)
Current status – Referred to the Governor for signature.
In the House (Passed)
Referred to the House Committee on Transportation. Had a hearing February 10th; passed out of committee with a minor clarifying amendment February 11th. Referred to Rules. Replaced with a striker by the prime sponsor on the floor and passed by the House February 19th. House concurred with Senate amendment March 10th.

In the Senate – (Passed)
Referred to the Senate Committee on Transportation; had a hearing February 25th. Amended and passed out of committee March 2nd. Referred to Rules. Passed the Senate March 6th, with a floor amendment making minor adjustments to reporting requirements. Referred to the House for concurrence.
Next step would be – Signature by the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB6659 is a companion bill in the Senate.

Comments –
The striker in the House moves the effective date back a year to 2021, requires written advance notice to law enforcement for the area where testing will occur, and makes some small adjustments reducing the reporting requirements which are summarized by staff at the end.

The amendments in the Senate Transportation Committee make minor changes to the requirements about advance notification of testing, shift the date by which umbrella insurance coverage is required to 90 days after the end of the session, and narrow the requirements for reporting of problems to collisions and moving violations when the vehicle is in autonomous mode.

HB2688

HB2688 – Expands transportation policy goals; requires evaluating projects using performance metrics for the goals before the Legislature considers them.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Shewmake (D; 42nd District; Whatcom County)
Current status – Had a hearing in the House Committee on Transportation, January 22nd.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB6398 is a companion bill in the Senate.

(a) Accessibility: To improve affordable access to the places and goods Washington residents, organizations, and businesses need to live, work, study, play, and pray;
(b) Safety: To provide for and improve the safety and security of transportation users, the transportation system, and anyone interacting with the system;
(c) Environment and climate: To enhance the quality of life through transportation investments that reduce greenhouse gas emissions, air pollution, water pollution, and toxics, promote energy conservation, and protect lands and waterways;
(d) Health and resilience: To promote healthy people and communities through pollution-free transportation, multimodal transportation, integrated land use and transportation projects, clean active transportation, and appropriate infrastructure;
(e) Equity and environmental justice: To eliminate historic and persistent barriers and prioritize investments meeting the goals in this section for highly impacted communities and vulnerable populations, which includes direct inclusion in decision making;
(f) Preservation: To maintain, preserve, and extend the life and utility of prior transportation systems and service investments that meet current and future needs and goals; and
(g) Economic vitality: To promote and develop transportation systems that support and enhance affordability, access to opportunity, and good jobs.

There are several pages of metrics which you can find on the last pages of the bill.

SB6491

SB6491 – Tax exemptions for integrated electric boat motors.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Mullet (D; 5th District; Issaquah)
Current status – Referred to the Senate Committee on Ways and Means; scheduled for a hearing there on February 20th at 3:30
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Comments –
(I think the definition of integrated electric motors may mean the exemptions basically apply to outboards; HB2486, which would extend the current tax breaks for marine electric motors for another ten years, seems to have a somewhat broader definition.)

Summary –
The bill creates a ten year sales and use tax exemption for any watercraft propulsion system that contains contains a motor, battery, charger, and gear reduction device in a single unit.

SB6399

SB6399 – Reduces emissions from on-demand transportation.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Lilas (D; 21st District; Lynwood) (Co-sponsors Nguyen, Carlyle, Lovelett, Kuderer, Stanford, Wellman, Billig, Saldaña, Das, C. Wilson, and Hunt)
Current status – Referred to the Senate Committee on Transportation. Scheduled for a hearing February 10th at 1:30.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
HB2310 is a companion bill in the House.

Summary – Requires companies scheduling rides or consumer food or goods deliveries through digital technology such as webpages or smartphone apps to provide data to create a baseline of their emissions, and to reduce them over time. (The bill exempts a variety of traditional transportation services like taxis and limousines, however.)

Details :
By July 1st, 2021, the Department of Ecology is to create a state-wide baseline for the 2018 greenhouse gas emissions from these companies’ vehicles – per customer mile and per food or goods delivery mile. By July 1st, 2022, it’s to adopt requirements, beginning in 2023, for reductions of those emissions; they’re to include annual targets and goals for increasing the percentage of passenger-miles traveled and customer food delivery-miles traveled using zero emission vehicles.

Beginning in January 2023, each company must submit a plan for making these reductions that are acceptable to Ecology. They’re to include ways to increase the proportion of their trips and the proportion of their vehicle miles made by zero emission vehicles, ways to decrease their average greenhouse gas emission rates, and ways to increase the proportion of passenger-miles traveled or customer food delivery-miles traveled relative to overall miles traveled. Their plans also have to consider incentives to encourage increasing the share of miles traveled by passengers whose walking, biking, or other active or zero emission modes of transportation are facilitated by using the companies’ vehicles, and incentives to increase the total miles they cover delivering food by walking, biking, or other zero emission transportation modes.

Ecology’s to do its best to have the rules minimize negative impacts on low-income and moderate-income drivers and to support providing clean mobility for low-income and moderate-income individuals. The rules for ride-hailing companies are to support the goals of the Growth Management Act. Ecology’s authorized to collect a fee from the companies to cover the expenses of administering the program.

HB2515

HB2515 – Requires new cars and pickups sold or registered in the state to be powered by batteries or fuel cells, starting in 2030.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Macri (D; 43rd District; Seattle)
Current status – Scheduled for a hearing in the House Committee on Transportation February 10th at 1:30 PM.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
Starting with the 2030 models, new cars and pickups sold or registered in the state would have to be battery powered fully electric vehicles or fuel cell vehicles. (Emergency services vehicles would be exempted.) In consultation with a number of other state agencies that deal with transportation, the State Transportation Commission would develop a plan for meeting the requirement during a transition period beginning in 2021.

The plan would include:
(a) An estimate of the number of new and used electric vehicles and internal combustion engine vehicles registered in Washington each year during the transition;
(b) An estimate of the number, type, year of installation, and location profile of the charging stations needed for prompt, efficient, and cost-effective fueling of the vehicles during the transition period, and of the yearly investments required to build them;
(c) An analysis of the generation, transmission, and distribution upgrades and build-out needed and the investment required for those;
(d) An analysis comparing the estimated purchase prices of new electric vehicles and internal combustion vehicles during the transition;
(e) An analysis comparing their estimated total costs of ownership during the transition ;
(f) An analysis of yearly job gains and losses during the transition as a result of the 2030 requirement;
(g) An analysis of its effects on state transportation revenues, and recommendations as to alternative sources of revenue to replace the gas tax;
(h) An estimate of the yearly decreases in gasoline and diesel sales as a result of the requirement, and of the money that would have otherwise been spent elsewhere retained in Washington;
(i) An analysis of the impacts on equity for low-income persons, and strategies for maximizing that in implementing the requirement;
(j) An assessment of potential impacts on passenger vehicle operations and charging infrastructure from developments in autonomous and shared services; and
(k) Recommendations for effectively coordinating with neighboring provincial and state jurisdictions so that infrastructure investments are coordinated, accessible, and sufficient to ensure an enduring, cost-effective, and adaptive transition.

The plan is to be submitted to the legislative committees with jurisdiction over transportation issues, and updated in 2025 and 2028.

By January 1, 2024 the Transportation Commission is to develop rules consistent with this plan to implement the 2030 requirement. (In the process, it is to maximize equity and total benefits to the state while minimizing costs and risks; minimize the administrative burden of implementing and complying with the regulations; rely upon the best available economic and scientific information about existing and projected technology capabilities; consult with a list of stakeholders in order to minimize duplicative or inconsistent requirements; and revise and adopt rules to accelerate or otherwise facilitate the intent of this law.)

The Transportation Commission is to appoint a committee to advise it in developing the scoping plan and to inform the rule-making process, composed of representatives from communities in the state that are likely to experience the greatest benefits or disadvantages from the act act including rural communities, communities of color, and low-income communities. (Members are to be chosen from people nominated by community members and other stakeholders.)

It’s also to appoint an economic and technology advancement advisory committee to advise it on ways to facilitate investment in and implementation of technological research and development opportunities that will help in shifting to electric vehicles, including demonstration projects; on funding opportunities; and on developing partnerships and technology transfer opportunities.

It’s to consult on effective strategies and methods with other states, the federal government, and to use the recommendations of the advisory committee and of consultations
in developing the scoping plan and adopting rules.

HB2486

HB2486 – Extends tax breaks for marine electric motors for another ten years.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Lekanoff (D; 40th District; San Juan Islands and Anacortes) (By request of the Governor)
Current status – Referred to the House Committee on Finance. Had a hearing February 6th. Did not pass out of committee by the cutoff for finance committees.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
New fully electric vessels with batteries that provide at least fifteen kilowatts of continuous power and outboard motors that meet that standard are currently exempted from the sales and use taxes until 2025. The bill would extend those exemptions for another ten years.

HB2470

HB2470 – Regulations for automated vehicles.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Hudgins (D; 11th District; Renton, Tukwila, Kent, and South Seattle) (By request of the Uniform Law Commission)
Current status – Referred to the House Committee on Transportation. Scheduled for a hearing February 10th at 1:30.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Comments
I don’t know if a company like Google qualifies as a manufacturer of “motor vehicle equipment” and would be able to put AVs on the road under the bill, or not…

Summary –
The bill provides for the registration of automated vehicles. It requires that anyone putting them on the road must have participated in a substantial manner in developing the system that controls them, must have submitted a safety self-assessment or equivalent report to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, and must be registered as a manufacturer of vehicles or “motor vehicle equipment” under its rules.

Persons applying to register as an “automated driving provider” must swear they are capable of undertaking the associated responsibilities; swear that sufficient evidence demonstrates that the automated driving system of each of their vehicles is capable of complying with all the traffic laws; and irrevocably appoint the Department of Transportation as a lawful agent for service of process in a lawsuit arising from the automated operation of their vehicles.

Details –
The bill creates a number of exceptions in the traffic laws to do things like allowing automated vehicles to stand unattended when current cars aren’t allowed to, and allowing personal electronic devices to be used in operating them, even though using a smartphone while driving a regular car isn’t legal.

HB2427

HB2427 – Adds addressing climate change to goals for regional planning processes.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Duerr (D; 1st District; Bothell) (Co-sponsors Springer, Shewmake, and Doglio)
Current status – Failed to pass out of committee by cutoff.
In the House – (Passed)
Had a hearing in the House Committee on Environment and Energy January 23rd. Substitute bill passed out of committee February 4th. Referred to Rules. Amended on the floor and passed by the House February 16th.

In the Senate –
Referred to the Senate Committee on Local Government; had a hearing February 25th.
Next step would be – Dead bill…
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB6453 is a companion bill in the Senate.

Comments –
The substitute rewrites the new goals. It drops supporting the State’s vehicle miles traveled goals and taking steps to mitigate climate change, but retains the more or less equivalent goal of reducing emissions. It shifts the goal of nurturing environmental, economic, and human health to the narrower one of protecting people and property from natural hazards exacerbated by the changing climate.

The substitute only requires the new goals for counties required to do reviews and evaluations under the “Buildable Lands” program (that is, ones west of the Cascades that had over 150,000 residents in 1996), and for counties with over 300,000 people and cities within those. It adds that it’s the Legislature’s intent to have the changes adopted by these jurisdictions as part of the next scheduled update under the GMA.

The amendments on the House floor add language about the variable ability of different cities to achieve the goals of the bill through planning, and require a UW study of the heat island effects on human health, salmon and ecology of cities over 100,000 people.

HB2310

HB2310 – Reduces emissions from on-demand transportation.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Fitzgibbon (D; 34th District; Vashon Island & NW Seattle) (Co-sponsors Ramel, Macri, Doglio, Cody, Hudgins, Pollet)
Current status – Failed to pass out of committee by cutoff.
In the House – (Passed)
Had a hearing in the House Committee on Environment & Energy January 14th. Substitute bill passed out of committee January 28th. Had a hearing in Appropriations February 8th; a 2nd Substitute with a minor amendment passed out of committee February 8th, and was referred to Rules February 11th. Passed the House February 16th.

In the Senate –
Referred to the Senate Committee on Transportation; had a hearing February 24th.
Next step would be – Dead bill…
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB6399 is a companion bill in the Senate.

Comments – “Electrifying Ride-hailing: Part 1 – Six Reasons Why Uber and Lyft Must Go Electric”, by the Union of Concerned Scientists’ Research and Deputy Director for the Clean Vehicles Program, discusses a number of recent pieces of research that provide pretty impressive reasons for doing this.

In the amended Second Substitute, the bill only applies to passenger services; the Department of Ecology is now to consult with the companies and report to the appropriate committees on how to reduce emissions from the food and goods delivery services the original covered.

It now specifies that Ecology ‘s baseline estimates should take account of periods when data on a vehicle’s movement may be recorded even though it’s not being driven as part of providing service for customers; of situations in which a car is being driven for more than one company, and of passenger-miles provided by zero-emissions transportation or transit that’s been offered through a company’s digital network.

It delays the date for implementing these plans for a year, until 2024, and allows Ecology to adjust the required date for submitting plans. It now requires a plan to outline the actions that the company will take to ensure that it will not increase negative financial outcomes for drivers. The department may now allow plans to get credit toward their targets by providing, funding, or financially supporting electrification infrastructure used to support these vehicles’ charging. The bill now specifies that Ecology can’t release any information that would be an invasion of privacy under current law, including the identification of passengers. It requires a report to the appropriate committees of the Legislature every two years on the reductions in emissions and vehicle miles achieved under these plans, and on the efficacy and sufficiency of incentives created by the Legislature to support shifting to zero emission vehicles.

Details :
By July 1st, 2021, the Department of Ecology is to create a state-wide baseline for the 2018 greenhouse gas emissions from these companies’ vehicles per customer mile and per food or goods delivery mile. By July 1st, 2022, it’s to adopt requirements, beginning in 2023, for reductions of those emissions; they’re to include annual targets and goals for increasing the percentage of passenger-miles traveled and customer food delivery-miles traveled using zero emission vehicles.

SB5412

SB5412 – Creates a low carbon fuel standard.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Saldaña (D; 37th District; Seattle)
Current status – Had a hearing on a proposed substitute in the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy & Technology January 16th. Failed to make it out of committee by 2020 cutoff; dead bill.
Next step would be –
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
(HB1110 began as an identical companion bill in the House last session; it passed out of the House with amendments, and out of the Senate Environment Committee with further amendments, but didn’t get out of the Transportation Committee there before cutoff.)

2109 Legislative History
Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy & Technology January 30th, 2019. Still in committee at the 2019 cutoff date; reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session.

Summary –
Requires the Department of Ecology to create rules to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions from transportation fuels used in Washington to 10% below 2017 levels by 2028 and to 20% below 2017 levels by 2035. (Fuels for aviation, shipping, and locomotives are exempted.)

Comments –
Governor Inslee’s 2020 budget proposal would provide $1.5 million for the Department of Ecology to implement the program.

Rep. Fitzgibbon’s LCFS bill, HB 2338, which passed out of the House Environment and House Transportation committees in 2018, would have created a standard at the same level. Carbon Wa’s testimony in support of that bill included quite a bit of useful analysis.

Climate Solutions has produced a flyer supporting the bill in 2019.

Details :

Standards –

Must be based on a full lifecycle analysis of the emissions associated with each fuel, including its production, storage, transportation, and combustion, as well as associated changes in land use.
Must measure the emissions from electricity for each electric utility based on its mix of power sources.
Ecology can require additional reporting from fuel distributors and utilities if it’s needed.
The department may create additional exemptions to avoid mismatched incentives among programs, fuel shifting among markets, or other unintended consequences.
It must decide whether or not emissions reductions under the clean fuels program will count toward meeting the requirements of the clean air rule, and vice versa.

– Credits and trading

Ecology must create a system for generating, banking, trading, and verifying credits for emissions reductions. Participation in this system is voluntary, and it’s also open to suppliers and users of aviation, shipping, and locomotive fuels who make reductions in their associated emissions. Credits may be awarded for producing, importing, or dispensing fuels for use in the state, and for other activities that reduce the emissions associated with transportation fuels. They may not be awarded for any fuels with emissions above 80% of the standard.

The bill extends the penalties for violations of the Clean Air Act to violations of this act. Ecology may charge a fee to cover the costs of the program; these and any penalties collected under the program go into a new clean fuels fund account, which can only be spent through appropriations.

– Cost containment mechanisms

These may include creating a credit clearance market to put a ceiling on prices by making credits available at a level Ecology sets, and/or some similar method to provide credits to participants who have not been able to attain them. (These mechanisms must be designed to financially discourage people from relying on them instead of reducing emissions.)

Ecology can create an entity to aggregate and use credits for emissions reductions made by parties that choose not to participate in the credit market.

– Relations with other states

Ecology should seek to adopt rules that work well with the systems in other jurisdictions that have adopted clean fuels standards (such as Oregon, California, and British Columbia), and in ones we import fuels from or export fuels to.

– Electric utility reinvestments

Half the revenue from credits earned by an electric utility must be reinvested in transportation electrification projects, and 60% of that (30% of the total) must be spent on projects in places where air pollution is bad enough so they’ve been identified as non-attainment or maintenance areas under the National Air Quality Act. Ecology may adopt requirements for the reinvestment of the other half of this revenue, in consultation with the utilities.

– Reporting
Requires an annual report about the program on Ecology’s website, and an annual report to appropriate committees of the Legislature, starting in 2022, including draft legislation for any recommended changes to achieve the program’s goals more efficiently.

Requires a fuel supply forecast by Commerce, in consultation with Ecology and the Department of Agriculture, at least 90 days in advance of each compliance period; this must include a prediction about whether sufficient credits from low carbon fuels (and banked credits) will be available to meet the program’s requirements.

The Joint Legislative Audit Committee must report to the Legislature on the impacts, costs and benefits of the first five years of the program before the end of 2027.

– Removes “poison pill” provisions

In 2015, Republicans inserted provisions into the transportation package to transfer the state’s funds for bicycling and transit to highway projects if a clean fuel standard was created; the bill removes those.

SB6108

SB6091 – Cancels Sound Transit 3 funding (and future Sound Transit funding) within Pierce County.
Prime Sponsor – Senator O’Ban (R; 28th District; Pierce County)
Current status – Scheduled for a hearing in the Senate Committee on Transportation February 4th at 3:30 PM.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Comments –
Senator O’Ban also has four bills from last session (SB5044, SB5043, SB5042, and SB5037) proposing various reductions in Sound Transit’s funding.

Summary –
Within Pierce County, the bill cancels any taxes approved by regional transit authority voters after January 1, 2015 (ie in the measure for funding Sound Transit 3). It cancels any bonds issued under that authority that contain a clause allowing it, and it restricts the spending of any revenue already collected to legal expenses for cancelling bonds or refunds to voters.

It also cancels, within Pierce County, any taxes approved in the future by the regional transit authority voters.

SB6082

SB6082 – Specifies that various current limitations on car manufacturers’ practices do not apply to Tesla’s direct sales model.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Carlyle (D; 36th District; Northwest Seattle)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Labor & Commerce February 4th. Failed to make it out of committee by 2020 cutoff; dead bill.
Next step would be –
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Comments –
Car dealers in a number of states have filed lawsuits or lobbied for legislation trying to keep Tesla from selling its cars through its own showrooms, without relying on dealerships. There’s currently an exception in Washington law that allows Tesla to do that. The bill would expand the exception to any manufacturer that only makes electric vehicles. (I’m told that Rivian is lobbying for it at this point.)

Summary –
The bill amends a current law that limits how manufacturers can discriminate among or compete with dealers to specify that its provisions don’t apply to any manufacturer of all electric vehicles.

SB5981

SB5981 – Creates a cap and trade system.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Carlyle (D; 36th District; Seattle)
Current status – Referred to Senate Committee on Environment, Energy & Technology. Had a hearing March 21st. Still in committee by the 2019 cutoff; reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session. Scheduled for a hearing on a draft substitute, February 4th 2020 at 10:00 AM.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

2020 Substitute –
The substitute delays any implementation of its provisions until a new act providing at least $2 billion per biennium in new transportation funding has been passed. It creates a fourth destination for the revenue, the Strategic Transportation Investment Account, though the draft leaves the division of funding between the four accounts open. This account must be used to provide cost-effective congestion relief, enhance all modes of mobility, assist highly impacted communities, and address the impacts of the transportation system on carbon pollution and other quality of life issues, including impacts to salmon. This funding can include projects to reduce congestion and improve air quality, including multimodal alternatives; ones to reduce carbon emissions from transportation including ones to accelerate the deployment of zero emission vehicles or deploy grid infrastructure for vehicle charging; and fish barrier correction projects.

The new version specifies that Ecology must allocate allowances to electric utilities between 2021 and 2035 covering their average annual emissions over each previous three year period, and that it’s to adopt rules “providing the method for distribution of no-cost allowances” to them between 2035 and 2050. (I assume this means the rules would gradually step down their allowances in some way to be determined in the future.) The substitute exempts emissions associated with electricity exported from the state. The State would actually get the allowances back immediately, auction them, and then give the proceeds to the utilities, to be used exclusively to minimize the bill’s impacts on customers. Each utility would have to develop a plan, conforming to rules from the UTC or the Department of Commerce, with a portfolio of mechanisms for aiding customers, like weatherization, energy efficiency, electrification of heating in buildings, electric vehicle incentives, and infrastructure. At least half the money would now have to go to rate relief.

Natural gas suppliers would be covered by a similar scheme, but their starting allocation in 2022 is left open in the draft, and it would be required to step down annually between then and 2035 in proportion to the gas utilities’ share of the reductions needed to meet the State’s 2035 target. Their plans would have to give the highest priority to assisting low-income customers, and use at least twenty-five percent of the money for rate relief for residential customers. Proceeds from the sale of allowances are used for investments to reduce emissions, including efficiency and renewable gas projects. The UTC is to provide for timely recovery for prudent and reasonable costs associated with complying with the act, and gas companies are prohibited from passing costs on to customers whose emissions are covered by its other provisions.

The substitute specifies that energy efficiency projects, carbon capture, and sequestration may be used to provide offsets. (It would no longer allow the aggregation of temporally separate offset activities.) It raises the limit on using offsets between 2024 and 2034 from 6% to 8%. The current bill requires certain percentages of offset projects to provide direct environmental benefits to the state. The substitute lets projects within the state count toward those requirements, and raises the required percentage between 2024 and 2034 from 50% to 90%. It says Ecology can restrict the use of offsets from areas and plants failing to meet air quality standards; eliminates the provisions allowing the use of up to an extra 5% of offsets from tribal lands; directs Ecology to keep the total quantity of allowances and offsets below the total of required compliance obligations “to the extent practicable,” and adds a regular review of the offset protocols.

The substitute drops the section prohibiting regional air quality agencies and other jurisdictions from directly regulating greenhouse gas emissions through a cap, charge, low-carbon fuel standard or clean fuels standard, or charge upon sale or use. It adds some progressive requirements about standards that have to be met by parties receiving project contracts, and moves various dates forward a year.

Summary of the 2019 bill –
Raises the State’s targets for greenhouse gas reductions to match the Paris Accords’. Creates a state greenhouse gas emissions cap and trade program requiring allowances for each metric ton of emissions above a gradually decreasing cap. Allowances are sold at auction, and can be sold or traded within the state and in linked programs in other jurisdictions. Requires setting a floor and a ceiling on prices for allowances, and mechanisms for increasing or decreasing the allowances available to help keep prices within that range.

Details –
The cap is to be set and adjusted over time so that covered entities contribute their proportional share of the overall State reductions needed to meet the new targets.

Covered entities
You need allowances if your facility emits more than 25,000 metric tons/year of CO2 equivalents (on its own or when the emissions associated with your direct purchases of electricity are included); if the associated emissions from your generating electricity in the state, importing it, or supplying natural gas are above that level; or if you’re a supplier of other fuels like gasoline or diesel that would produce emissions above that level when combusted. You can also opt-in to the program if you’re responsible for emissions but aren’t required to participate (if, for example, you can make reductions cheaply and want to make money by selling the allowances you earn), or if you just want to trade in the market. Allowances can be banked and used in later years. There’s a penalty of $200 per allowance, adjusted for inflation starting in 2025, for failing to provide enough of them to cover your emissions in a given year, as well as a penalty of up to $10,000 for violations of the rules.

Offsets
Between 2021 and 2023 up to 8% of an entities’ obligations may be met with approved offset credits, provided at least 75% of those reduce emissions in the state; through 2034 up to 6% of them may be met with offsets if at least 50% of those reduce emissions in Washington. At any point another 5% may be met through offsets on tribal land in the US or a linked jurisdiction. (The bill may intend this to mean tribal land in the state, but it doesn’t say so.) The bill creates an advisory committee to provide guidance on rules to increase offset projects with other environmental benefits in the state while prioritizing projects that “benefit highly impacted communities, Indian tribes, and natural and working lands.”

Exemptions
The bill exempts biomass from various approved sources, all biofuels, aviation fuel, coal burned at the Transalta plant, marine fuel burned outside the state, vented or unintentional emissions, and military installations.

Between 2021 and 2035, it provides a gradually decreasing number of free allowances to energy-intensive trade exposed industries in eleven categories, and to any others the Department of Commerce may identify through quantitive criteria about their energy use and trade exposure. (However, the bill also says in Section 14(1) that they don’t have to start complying until 2023…) The number of free allowances is to decrease at the same rate needed for reductions in allowances for covered entities as a whole to result in meeting the targets; facilities with relatively lower emissions are to receive more allowances. (The Department’s to review the program every two years to see if it is avoiding significant leakage from the transfer of activities out of state, or awarding more free allowances than are necessary for that goal.)

If a 100% Clean Electricity bill passes, the bill requires the Department of Ecology to develop rules, in consultation with Commerce and the UTC, providing utilities with enough free allowances through 2035 to avoid the bill’s impacting rates or charges. It provides natural gas utilities free allowances for the gas sold to low-income customers, so the company does not have to pay to offset those emissions. (I think that the bill requires the value of those allowances to be spent funding measures to benefit low-income consumers such as weatherization, conservation, and help paying bills.)

Investments
The bill creates a climate oversight board with a lot of members, including representatives of the Governor, the Commissioner of Public Lands, the Auditor, four legislators, two tribal representatives, various stakeholders, and an indeterminate number of other experts. (It isn’t clear how some of these people are to be selected.) It’s responsible for ongoing review of the cap and trade system and the funding provided by it, but the bill doesn’t say what happens to any conclusions it draws from that review, or what if any power it has to affect what it “reviews”.

The bill creates an environmental and economic justice panel, appointed by the Governor. The panel’s to include two members representing union labor; two members representing tribal governments; and five other members, including at least one tribal leader and at least two nontribal leaders representing the interests of vulnerable populations residing in “highly impacted communities”. (Those communities are to be identified by the Department of Health, considering “vulnerable populations” and environmental hazards; including census tracts that are partly or wholly on tribal land; and building on a particular analysis already completed by the UW.) The panel’s to be co-chaired by a tribal leader and a representative of the interests of highly impacted communities. It’s to make recommendations on the plans for spending this revenue and their implementation, evaluate the funding levels, and analyze the policies to determine if they produce the intended improvements. The Department of Ecology is to consult with the panel and “accord substantial weight” to its recommendations in developing implementation plans for spending from each of the funds the bill sets up, and in developing biennial spending plans for each of them. It’s to update the identification of highly impacted areas every two years “under advisement from” the panel.

Any agency receiving funding from the system must consult with Indian tribes “on all decisions that may affect Indian tribes’ rights and interests in their tribal lands.” (Perhaps this only covers decisions implementing this bill, but it doesn’t seem to say that.) The process must be independent of any public participation process required by state law, or by a state agency, and regardless of whether the agency receives a request for consultation. No project that affects tribal lands can be funded without “meaningful consultation” with affected Indian tribes. Any project that “directly impacts” tribal lands must have written consent from the relevant tribal governments.

40% of the revenue goes to an energy transformation account, to be spent on projects and programs in Washington that provide additional reductions in carbon pollution. These include residential, industrial, construction, transportation, and agricultural investments in renewable energy, efficiency, conservation, sequestration, and carbon emissions reductions. They have to provide real, specific, quantifiable, additional, and verifiable reductions for periods of time to be determined by the Department, and meet high labor standards. They have to be ranked and sortable based on quantitative performance metrics, including the avoided cost of a ton of carbon dioxide, though the bill does not say they have to be selected on that basis, or provide any criteria for deciding which projects that meet the basic standards will be selected, beyond saying 10% of these funds have to be spent in highly impacted areas.

35% of the revenue goes to an energy transition account, to provide funding to assist low-income households with increased energy prices; to help provide clean energy and low-carbon housing, transportation options, and technologies to people with greater barriers to accessing those, and where pollution is concentrated; and to support displaced fossil fuel-related industry workers. Spending has to be prioritized to help with additional energy and transportation costs resulting from policies and programs to reduce fossil fuel use, and to assist displaced workers, but it can also be used “to reduce carbon pollution and reduce vulnerable population characteristics or environmental burdens in highly impacted communities.” Thus, the money can be spent in a very wide variety of ways, including direct financial assistance, social and health services programs, energy bill subsidies, efficiency and weatherization services, affordable transportation, affordable housing, and improved community services. The Department must develop a worker support program for bargaining unit and nonsupervisory fossil fuel industry workers who are affected by the transition away from fossil fuels to a clean energy economy, and may allocate additional funds to it if there’s an unexpected amount of dislocation.

25% of the revenue goes to a climate impacts resilience account. Expenditures from it are to prioritize funding and investments to benefit “highly impacted communities”. At least half of it’s to go to community preparedness and awareness “before, during, and after” wildfires; resources to help tribal communities deal with wildfires; relocating tribal communities impacted by flooding and sea level rise; and programs to increase awareness of and preparedness for impacts of climate change and to educate people about ways to reduce pollution. The remainder’s to be spent on “natural resources resilience and related purposes” including, but not limited to, funding for improving forest and natural lands’ health and resilience to climate change, including thinning and prescribed fire projects and wildland fire prevention; for reducing stormwater impacts; for reducing flooding risks; for improving the availability and reliability of water supplies for in-stream and out-of-stream uses; for fish barrier correction projects; for projects to prepare for sea level rise and restore habitats, including small forestland owner fish passage barrier projects; and for adapting to and remediating the impacts of ocean acidification.

Details –
There are provisions for entering into agreements linking the program and its auctions with other jurisdictions’. The bill requires creating an advisory committee to make recommendations about designing and implementing the system, and to report on its functioning every two years. It requires appointing an independent organization to monitor and report on the auctions and on secondary markets that buy and sell allowances. It requires creating an electronic system for handling allowances and the auctions, or sharing another jurisdiction’s.

It prohibits regional air quality agencies and local jurisdictions regulating greenhouse gas emissions through “a cap, charge, low-carbon fuel standard or clean fuels standard, or charge upon the sale or use”.

SB5970

SB970 – Authorizes $5 billion in bonds backed by revenue from SB5971.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Hobbs (D; 44th District; Lake Stevens)
Current status – Referred to the Senate Committee on Transportation. Had a hearing there February 28th. Passed out of committee to Rules March 6th 2019. Still in committee by the end of the 2019 session. Reintroduced and retained in present status in 2020 session; referred to Transportation.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
(SB5971 raises the revenue to support these bonds. SB5972 appropriates the new funds.)

Summary –
The bill authorizes $5 billion in bonds for transportation projects, backed by new revenue from SB5971.

SB5972

SB972 – Appropriates the additional revenue for transportation from SB5971.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Hobbs (D; 44th District; Lake Stevens)
Current status – Referred to the Senate Committee on Transportation. Had a hearing there February 28th. Substitute bill passed out of committee to Rules March 7th 2019. Still in committee by the end of the 2019 session. Reintroduced and retained in present status in 2020 session; referred to Transportation.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
(SB5970 authorizes $5 billion in bonds to fund the Forward Washington projects, backed by the additional revenue SB5971 would raise for that account.)

Comments –
The substitute states that up to $290 million is expected from the bonds authorized by SB5970 during this biennium, and makes appropriations for debt service. It reduces the appropriation for grid upgrades from $50 million to $45 million, and removes the statement about intending to fund the Chelan LINK transit facilities over time. It appropriates $3 million for vanpools from the Forward Flexible account rather than from the multi-modal transportation account.

Summary – Appropriations (from the new revenue only) for the 2019-2021 Biennium

From the new Forward Washington account:
DOT Facilities Maintenance, Operations, and Construction – $2 million
DOT Highway Maintenance – $50 million
DOT Traffic Operations – $5 million
DOT Planning, Data and Research – $0.1 million for Columbia River bridge governance study
Highway improvements projects as listed in the LEAP Plan – $770.6 million (including $350 million for culvert replacement to support salmon and $50 million for storm water improvements).
Highway preservation projects as listed in the LEAP Plan – $100 million
Ferry construction – $160 million
Local projects as listed in the LEAP Plan – $23.6 million
Freight Mobility Investment Account – $2.5 million
Rural Arterial Trust Account – $3.5 million
Transportation Improvement Account – $9 million
County Arterial Preservation Account $3.5 million

Total = $1.3 billion (or $950 million without the culvert replacements for fish passage).

From the new Forward Flexible account:
Grant program for special needs transportation – $20 million
Transit coordination grants – $0.5 million
Bus and bus facility grants – $30 million
Transportation demand management – $4.5 million
Transportation grid electrification grants – $50 million
Complete Streets program – $9 million
Rail capital projects as listed in the LEAP Plan – $15 million
Washington Ports grants program – $10 million
Safe routes to schools – $6 million
Pedestrian and bike safety programs – $16.5 million
Freight Mobility Multimodal account – $2.5 million
Rural Mobility Grant Program – $11 million
Alternative fuel tax credits – $5 million
Distribution to cities and counties for transportation purposes – $37.5 million

Total = $220 million (or something slightly over $182 million if you figure that most of the city and county money will also go to road construction and repair, like the money in the Forward Washington account.)

The bill also designates the US 2 Trestle replacement; replacing the I-5 Bridge over the Columbia River replacement; fish passage barrier removal projects; the Hood River Bridge replacement; the Bridge of the Gods replacement; and all future bridges over the Columbia River that connect Washington with Oregon as projects of statewide significance under SB5847, which had a hearing in the committee February 19th. Those projects are estimated to cost at least $1 billon each; if SB5847 passes, it would have DOT appoint a project coordinator and assemble a dedicated team to expedite the planning and construction of each project.

SB5971

SB971 – Raises revenue to fund transportation projects. (Includes a carbon fee.)
Prime Sponsor – Senator Hobbs (D; 44th District; Lake Stevens)
Current status – Referred to the Senate Committee on Transportation. Had a hearing there February 28th. 1st substitute with significant changes passed out of committee March 6th. Referred to Ways and Means; had a hearing, but still in that committee at the end of the 2019 session. Reintroduced and retained in present status in 2020 session.
Next step would be – Action by Ways and Means.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
(SB5970 authorizes $5 billion in bonds to fund projects, backed by the additional revenue this bill would raise. SB5972 appropriates the new funds.)

Comments –
The changes in the 1st substitute are summarized on pp. 11-12 of the Senate Bill Report. Among other things, it reduces the carbon fee to $10/tonne for utilities, lowers the increase in EV registration fees to $150 from $200, adds $50 to the registration fee for hybrids, and expands the exemptions for energy-intensive and trade-exposed industries in various ways.

Summary –

The bill raises the fuel tax by 6¢/gallon. It adds a freight project fee of 10% of the license fee on vehicles over 10,000 pounds to the current 15% fee and increases the new fee by 3% every two years until 2031. It adds $5 to the $30 passenger car license fee. It raises the vehicle trip permit from $25 to $45. It raises the fee for an international fuel tax agreement license from $10 to $32.50. Starting in 2020, it raises the fee for an enhanced driver’s license from $24 to $54, and the fee for shorter extensions from $4/year to $9/year. It raises the annual registration fee for electric vehicles from $150 to $350. It adds a surcharge of 25¢ to each ferry ride. It puts a carbon pollution fee of $15/metric ton of CO2 (with no inflation adjustments) on the carbon content of electricity and on fossil fuels, other than those used to generate electricity in the state. These increased revenues go to a new Forward Washington transportation account, which is mostly appropriated for highway projects in SB5972. The bill adds two $10 fees to the license fees for vehicles up to 12,000 pounds; they both go to the Forward Washington account until June 30th, 2020; after that one of them goes to the highway patrol, ferries, and various other transportation funds.

The bill raises the sales and use taxes on automobiles, auto parts, and bicycles 1%. It creates a special transportation benefit assessment on the increase in assessed value resulting from new construction – $2/$1,000 in added value for residential property; $1/$1,000 for manufacturing facilities; and $4/$1,000 for other construction. It raises the mobile home registration fee from $75 to $100, and adds an additional fee of $10. It raises the sales and use taxes on car rentals 1%. It charges a 50¢ fee for each ride in a for-hire vehicle like a taxi or Uber. It creates an additional fine for driving in the HOV lane illegally of $175 for the first offense, $250 for the second offense, and $350 for each offense after that. 14.5% of the revenue from car rental taxes, and the increased revenue from these other changes goes to a new Forward Flexible account, which is mostly appropriated for other transportation than highways in SB5972.

Aviation fuel; agricultural fuel; the Transalta coal plant; biogas; log trucks; facilities making renewable energy equipment; copper, nickel, lead, and zinc mining; the fuel used outside the state by trucks and vessels primarily engaged in interstate commerce; and various other obvious things are exempted from the carbon fee. The Department of Commerce is to develop objective numerical standards for the energy intensity and trade exposure which will qualify energy-intensive trade-exposed manufacturing facilities (EITEs) as exempt.

Details:
The bill prohibits any other fees within the state on the carbon in fossil fuels or used in the production of electricity. (I think this section intends to prohibit cities, counties and other jurisdictions from doing this, though the first sentence reads as if it’s to keep the Legislature from passing any other carbon fees.)

It adds “local agencies” to the current poison pill provisions about moving the funding for transit and highway safety into the construction fund if an agency adopts a low carbon fuel standard. Presumably, this is motivated by the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency considering adopting a Regional Clean Fuel Standard for King, Pierce, Kitsap, and Snohomish Counties. (People say it announced it would do this, but their website doesn’t say that yet.)

Commerce is to create a stakeholder work group to study how to efficiently and consistently integrate carbon pricing in electricity markets and recommend ways to improve their carbon transparency and market liquidity to the Legislature. By 2026, the Department of Revenue, Commerce, Ecology are to review the method for protecting EITEs and the merits of alternatives.

It would let utilities deduct any carbon fees they pay for the carbon content of imported electricity from the alternative compliance fees they would pay under SB5116 if they failed to meet the targets for reducing their use of fossil fuels under that bill, so they would not pay twice.

HB1999

HB1999 – Allows the Department of Ecology to adopt Zero Emission Vehicle standards.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Kloba (D, 1st District, Kirkland)
Current status – Had a hearing in the House Committee on Environment and Energy February 19th. Still in committee by 2019 cutoff; reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB5811 is an identical companion bill in the Senate.

Comments –
SB5336 would also do this, but it includes a lot of other measures to reduce transportation emissions.

Summary –

The bill removes the prohibition on adopting the California Zero Emission Vehicle standards from the current law authorizing Ecology to adopt the rest of California’s emissions standards.

(It may also extend the range of vehicles that Ecology’s authorized to regulate some by changing its authority over the emissions from “medium duty passenger vehicles” to authority over “medium duty vehicles”.)

HB1986

HB1986 – Tax exemptions for electric bicycles.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Shewmake (D; 42nd District; Whatcom County)
Current status – Had a hearing in the House Committee on Finance, February 21st. Still in committee by 2019 cutoff; reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
The bill creates a sales and use tax exemption for buyers of electric bicycles and related cycling equipment.

Details:
The exemption also applies to up to $200 of other cycling equipment, like a helmet or a bike lock. It expires on May 1st, 2025 or when $500,000 in sales have been exempted. (The bill declares the intention to extend the expiration date if the exemptions have produced at least a 25% increase in the number of electric bikes by the time it’s reviewed, which I think would be in ten years or less.)

SB5811

SB5811 – Allows the Department of Ecology to adopt Zero Emission Vehicle standards.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Nguyen (D; 34th District; White Center)
Current status – Referred to the Governor for signature.
In the Senate – (Passed by the Senate)
Returned to Senate Rules by the House at end of 2019 Session; reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session. Placed on 3rd reading by the Rules Committee. Passed by the Senate January 15th. Senate concurred in the House amendments March 9th.

In the House – (Passed by the House)
Referred to the House Committee on Environment and Energy. Had a hearing February 13th; replaced by a striker and passed out of committee February 20th. Referred to Appropriations; had a hearing there on February 29th. Passed out of Appropriations March 2nd and referred to Rules. Passed by the House March 5th.
Next step would be – Signature by the Governor.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
HB1999 is an identical companion bill in the House.

Comments –
Coltura has a flyer about the bill.

The striker in the House Committee on Environment and Energy adopts the zero emissions vehicle standards, rather than simply removing the prohibition on adopting them from the current law. It no longer limits them to the model years that Oregon’s version covers, and it no longer says that vehicles for the model year in which the requirement comes into effect aren’t subject to the requirement. It also repeals current provisions (in RCW 70.120A.020) requiring Ecology to provide two systems of early credits and banking for ZEVs produced and sold before the implementation of the program in Washington.

2019 Legislative History –
In the Senate (Passed)
Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy & Technology, February 12th at 10:00 AM. Passed out of committee February 14th; sent to Rules for 2nd Reading; placed on 2nd Reading February 19th. Passed by the Senate March 4th.
In the House – 2019
Referred to the House Committee on Energy and Environment. Had a hearing Tuesday March 19th. Returned to Senate Rules by the House at end of 2019 Session;

Comments –
SB5336 would also do this, but it includes a lot of other measures to reduce transportation emissions.

Summary –
The bill removes the prohibition on adopting the California Zero Emission Vehicle standards from the current law authorizing Ecology to adopt the rest of California’s emissions standards.

HB1832 – 2019

HB1832 – Electrifying public vehicle fleets.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Macri (D; 43rd District; Seattle)
Current status – Had a hearing in the House Committee on State Government & Tribal Relations, February 13th. A much weakened substitute bill passed out of committee February 22nd; referred to the House Committee on Transportation. Had a hearing there February 28th 2019. Reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session.
Next step would be – Action by the Transportation Committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
The House Bill Analysis is available here.

Comments – The changes in the substitute bill are summarized on its first page. It removes all the requirements for electrifying fleets by particular dates, converts the plan for doing that to a study of the issues, and shifts the responsibility for doing that from the Department of Enterprise Services to the Joint Transportation Committee.

Summary –

Requires any 2023 model light duty vehicles or later ones that state agencies own or operate to be battery electrics or fuel cell vehicles. By 2026, a similar rule would apply to medium and heavy duty vehicles.

Requires any 2025 model light duty vehicles or later ones that local governments own or operate to be battery electrics or fuel cell vehicles. By 2027, a similar rule would apply to medium and heavy duty vehicles.

Prohibits the Department of Licensing from registering public vehicles that don’t meet the requirements. Would allow the Department of Enterprise Services to exempt emergency vehicles and any others if it determined there weren’t adequate vehicles on the market to meet their requirements.

Requires the Department of Enterprise Services to develop a plan for electrifying public vehicles and meeting these requirements by 2021, in consultation with a number of other stakeholders and with consideration of other vehicle fleet programs.

Details:

The plan must include:

Estimates for the number of publicly owned electric vehicles and internal combustion engine vehicles during the period between 2121 and 2030, broken down by a number of categories;
Estimates for the facilities needed to provide prompt, efficient, and cost-effective fueling for them during this transition, and an estimate of the yearly and total cost of building those;
An analysis of the electrical upgrades needed for those facilities and of the investment required to implement them;
Estimates of the differences between the purchase price of new electric and internal combustion vehicles during this transition;
Estimates of their respective lifetime costs of ownership during the period, including estimates of the yearly reductions in gasoline and diesel sales, the savings to taxpayers from those, and of the money that would have gone elsewhere retained in the state; and,
Identification of mechanisms that could be utilized to finance the transition of public fleets to electric vehicles.

It’s to include recommendations for rules to exempt vehicles from the requirements, and the Department’s also to evaluate the total potential costs and total potential economic and noneconomic benefits of the plan using the best available economic models, emission estimation techniques, and other scientific methods.

HB1664 -2019

HB1664 – Advancing electric transportation.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Slatter (D; 48th District; Bellevue, Redmond, Kirkland) (By request of the Governor.)
Current status – Referred to the House Committee on Transportation. Still in committee by 2019 cutoff. Reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB5336 is an identical companion bill in the Senate.

Comments –
The bill only seems to provide specific provisions for private utilities and municipal utilities, not the PUDs.

Summary –

Washington would join the other nine states that have adopted California’s zero emission vehicle standards. (Those currently require manufacturers to have about 2.5% of the cars they sell in a given state be free of tailpipe emissions, and establish a market for trading credits that manufacturers who sell more battery and fuel-cell cars than required can sell to those who don’t sell enough or decide it would be cheaper to buy credits than produce and sell the cars.)

The bill requires all utilities to engage in electrifying transportation, and specifically authorizes them to build and promote charging infrastructure (as well as to invest in making energy infrastructure in general more efficient). It removes the requirement that their chargers must be in places where cars will plug in for at least four hours if they want to earn a rate of return on the investment.

It authorizes cities with municipal utilities serving more than 400,000 customers to do as much as the Washington Constitution allows to provide financing to help customers electrify transportation, and to offer programs, services, and make investments to provide that, if that will benefit ratepayers and the city has adopted a plan for electrifying transportation.

Utilities regulated by the UTC can submit a plan for investing in chargers or providing other programs, services, or incentives to support electrifying transportation. (In fact, they now have to have a plan if they want earn an increased rate of return on EV infrastructure.) The plan may not “increase costs to customers in excess of one-quarter of one percent above the benefits of electric transportation to all customers” over the twenty years of a utility’s current integrated resource plan. The UTC can allow an addition to the rate of return of up to 2% for capital investments in chargers behind the customer’s meter, provided that won’t increase costs to ratepayers more than 0.25%.

The bill provides a sales tax exemption of up to $1,000 and a use tax exemption of up to $1,000 on the sale or lease of new or used fully electric cars, light trucks, and medium-duty passenger vehicles with a manufacturer’s suggested retail price of less than $45,000 for the base model. (If you buy the car at the end of the lease you can get the tax exemptions on that purchase as well as on the lease payments.) The exemption expires when the number of vehicles that have received the exemption reaches 10% of the number of cars, light trucks and medium-duty passenger vehicles in the state.

It funds the program with the vehicle registration fee for plug-in cars that go at least 30 miles on the battery and raises it from $100/year to $150. (That fee currently goes to the motor vehicle fund to be spent on highways.)

Details –
In reviewing a private utility’s electrification plan, the UTC has to consider multiple options for the electrification of transportation for all customer classes; its impact on loads, and whether demand response or opportunities for managing load are appropriate; system reliability and distribution system efficiencies; interoperability concerns, including the interaction of hardware and software systems in proposals; benefits and costs; and the overall customer experience.

The bill removes the current prohibition against adopting California’s zero emissions vehicle requirements, and no longer requires Ecology to have any changes in emissions rules reviewed by an advisory group of stakeholders.

SB5353

SB5353 – Promoting redevelopment to support transit.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Zeiger (R; 25th District; Pierce County)
Current status – Had a hearing before the Senate Committee on Local Government February 5th. Passed out of committee February 19th and referred to Ways and Means. Still in the house of origin by 2019 cutoff; reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session.
Next step would be – Action by Ways and Means.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
The bill authorizes certain counties to lower property taxes to encourage the development of more housing in areas around transit by expanding some current provisions for lowering taxes in other “residential targeted areas”.

Details:
Counties can reduce taxes on new housing units in residential targeted areas by using special lower valuations in their property tax assessments.

There are various requirements for when these can be created, including some about where they can be located. The bill expands the rules about permissible locations to allow them to be created by counties that want to promote transit supportive densities and efficient land use in an area that’s within an urban growth area; is in the potential annexation area of a city with a population of at least two hundred thousand; and is within a quarter mile of a corridor where bus service is scheduled at least every fifteen minutes for no less than ten hours per day. (The route must be in service or have planned service within five years).

HB1397

HB1397 – Creates work group on electric and hybrid airplanes.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Slatter (D; 48th District; Bellevue, Redmond, Kirkland)
Current status – Returned to House Rules 3rd Reading by Senate at end of 2019 Session. Reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session. Now in the House Rules “X” file.
Next step would be – Action by the Rules Committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

2019 History
In the House (Passed)
Had a hearing before the House Committee on Transportation on February 7th. Passed out of committee February 25th; referred to Rules. Placed on 2nd reading by the Rules Committee March 1st. Passed by the House March 5th.

In the Senate
Referred to the Senate Transportation Committee. Had a hearing March 18th. Passed out of committee with amendments to cover using fuel cells March 26th; referred to Rules. Returned to House Rules 3rd Reading by Senate at end of 2019 Session.

Summary –
The bill requires the Department of Transportation to convene a work group on hybrid and electric regional aircraft, including representatives from the electric aircraft industry, the aircraft manufacturing industry, electric utility districts, the battery industry, the Department of Commerce, the Department of Transportation Aviation Division, the Airline Pilots’ Association, a primary airport representing an airport association, and the airline industry.

They’re to study, at least:

Infrastructure requirements necessary to facilitate electric aircraft operations at airports;
Potential economic and public benefits including the direct and indirect impact on the state’s manufacturing and service jobs and wages;
Potential incentives for industry in the manufacturing and operation of electric aircraft for regional air travel;
Educational and workforce requirements for manufacturing and maintaining these planes;
Demand and forecast for their use, including an expected timeline for their entering the market given Federal certification requirements;
Identification of up to six airports in the state that might benefit from a pilot program once such an aircraft for commercial use is available; and,
Recommendations to further their adoption, including specific, measurable goals for the years 2030, 2040, and 2050 that reflect progressive and substantial increases in their use.

The work group must submit a report with recommendations to both transportation committees of the Legislature by November 15, 2020, as well as a progress report on any efforts to implement the recommendations by February 15, 2021, and every two years after that.

SB5336

SB5336 – Advancing electric transportation.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Palumbo (D, 1st District, Snohomish County) (Requested by the Governor.)
Current status – Had a hearing in the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy & Technology, February 12th. Significantly changed substitute bill passed out of committee February 20th. Referred to the Committee on Transportation, which passed a 2nd substitute with some further changes March 6th. Referred to Ways and Means. Had a hearing March 19th 2019. Reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
HB1664 is an identical companion bill in the House.

Comments –
First substitute:
The changes in the first substitute bill are summarized on p. 5 of the Senate Bill Report. (However, the bill only expands existing commercial vehicle tax breaks; it doesn’t “add” them. The original didn’t “require” Ecology to adopt the ZEV standard; it removed the prohibition on doing that.)

The substitute leaves the prohibition on adopting the Zero Emission Vehicle Standard in place. The Department of Commerce is to create a program to provide, subject to funding, rebates between $1,250 and $5,000 for low and moderate income households in areas with high levels of air pollution that scrap a vehicle that’s more than ten years old and replace it with a new or used zero-emission vehicle. [My economist friends predict that this will raise the price of used ZEVs.]

It specifies that local sales and use taxes are included in the exemptions. It roughly doubles the B&O and public utility tax credits for clean alternative fuel commercial vehicles, raises the annual cap on these exemptions from six million to forty, and extends the exemption from 2021 to 2050. Rather than raising registration fees on EVs, it funds the first thirty-three million in repayments to the general fund for the commercial vehicle tax exemptions from the multi-modal transportation account and anything above that as well as the reimbursements for the sales and use tax exemptions from the forward flexible account (which seems to be some part of the motor vehicle fund).

It makes all utilities’ authorizations for investments in EV infrastructure dependent on their creation of approved electrification of transportation plans, and sets 2030 as the limit to how long private utilities can earn incentive rates of return on investments in electric vehicle infrastructure. (The original bill only seemed to provide specific provisions for private utilities and municipal utilities, not the PUDs.)

Second substitute:
The second substitute has the tax exemptions expire at a $100 million cap, rather than when they’ve been received by 10% of the registered vehicles, and simply caps the commercial vehicle exemptions at $33 million. It eliminates the rebate program for scrapping vehicles.

Summary of the original bill –

Utilities regulated by the UTC can submit a plan for investing in chargers or providing other programs, services, or incentives to support electrifying transportation. (In fact, they now have to have a plan if they want earn an increased rate of return on EV infrastructure.) The plan may not “increase costs to customers in excess of one-quarter of one percent above the benefits of electric transportation to all customers” over the twenty years of its current integrated resource plan. The UTC can allow an addition to the rate of return of up to 2% for capital investments in chargers behind the customer’s meter, provided that won’t increase costs to ratepayers more than 0.25%.

SB5128

SB5128 – Reduces the registration fee for electric motorcycles.
Prime Sponsor – Senator Rolfes (D, 23rd District, Kitsap County)
Current status – Had hearing before the Senate Transportation Committee January 28th. Passed out of committee February 5th. Referred to Rules. Reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session. Sent to the “X” file.
Next step would be – Action by the Rules Committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
Senate Bill Report is available here.

Comments –
The substitute bill merely changed the date at which the reduction would become effective by a few months.

Summary –
Currently, owners of electric motorcycles pay the same annual registration fee as the owners of electric cars that can travel over 30 miles on the battery. The bill reduces the fee for motorcycles to $30/yr.

Comments – Gasoline motorcycles and scooters actually produce more air pollution and smog than cars; in fact, the California Air Resources Board estimates an average motorbike is about 10 times more polluting per mile than a passenger car, light truck or SUV. They are about twice as fuel efficient as an average cars, though, and they take less energy to produce, so riding one does reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

An electric bike doesn’t produce any smog, and riding one instead of a gas powered bike produces roughly half the reduction in CO2 emissions that switching from a gas car to an electric one does. (If the gas car is going 10,000 miles a year at 25 mpg it’s using 400 gallons; the gas bike would be using 200 gallons.)

HB1127

HB1127 – Allows utilities to electrify transportation infrastructure.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Morris (D, 40th District, Mount Vernon)
Current status – Referred to the Committee on Environment & Energy. Reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Summary –
Allows utilities to adopt transportation electrification plans if they determine that outreach and investment in electrification infrastructure is cost-effective in the context of acquiring new resources, considering system benefits and costs to ratepayers. (The bill says that system benefits for a utility exist “where financial, reliability, and quality benefits of the electrification of transportation are conferred equally among all ratepayers on the distribution system or among the utility’s resource generation portfolio.”) If they aren’t acquiring resources, they may determine it’s cost-effective considering those factors and “long-term contracted wholesale electricity supply that will result in a greater ratepayer benefit than the individual benefit from the program cost.” [I’m not sure what either section in quotes is supposed to mean…]

These plans may consider multiple options for transportation electrification across all customer classes; its anticipated impact on loads and whether load management opportunities including demand response, direct load control and dynamic pricing, are appropriate; system reliability and distribution system efficiencies; interoperability concerns, including those between hardware and software systems; and their customers’ overall experience.

Utilities that determine outreach and investment in such infrastructure is cost-effective may offer programs to electrify transportation infrastructure to their customers, including advertising to promote services, rebates and incentives they or others provide.

If specific funding for it is appropriated by June 30th, 2019, the Department of Commerce shall arrange for a study of the capital expenditures projected to be required by growth in distributed resources, including photovoltaic systems, electric vehicles, and any other customer-owned technologies likely to affect capital expenditures, including a low and high adoption scenario for each resource.

HB1110

HB1110 – Creates a low carbon fuel standard.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Fitzgibbon (D, 34th District, Vashon Island & West Seattle)
Current status – Returned to House Rules, 3rd Reading by Senate at end of 2019 Session; reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session. Passed the House January 30th. Referred to the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy and Technology. Replaced with a striker and passed out of committee February 25th. Referred to the Transportation Committee and had a hearing there March 2nd.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB5412 is the identical companion bill in the Senate.
House Bill Analysis

*********
2019 history –
In the House (Passed)-
2019 Session History – Amended in minor ways and reported out of the House Environment and Energy Committee as SHB1110, January 24th. Passed out of the Transportation Committee February 14th. Had a hearing in the House Committee on Appropriations February 21st; a 2nd substitute version with further changes passed out of Appropriations February 25th. Referred to Rules February 28th. Passed the House with a number of amendments March 12th.
In the Senate-
Referred to the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy & Technology. Had hearing March 19th; amended by a striker and passed out of committee March 21st. Referred to Transportation Committee. Had a hearing on a proposed striker by Senator Hobbs Wednesday, April 4th. Striker was not adopted. Bill was still in committee by 2019 cutoff. Returned to House Rules, 3rd Reading by Senate at end of 2019 Session

Proposed striker in the Senate…
Senator Hobbs’s striker would have put a fee of $6/tonne of carbon on transportation fuels for 2021-2028 (with no inflation adjustment), then reset the fee by the Legislature for 2029-2035. 50% of the revenue would have gone to motor vehicles and 50% to multi-modal. There were various exemptions, a null and void clause if rule making wasn’t funded in this session’s omnibus transportation package, and a 5¢/gallon tax on the biofuel included in blended fuels.

Changes in the Senate
The changes in the Senate striker are summarized on its last page. Though the summary doesn’t mention it, the striker dropped the prohibition on giving credits to palm oil fuels, which may have been beside the point, since the bill requires the rules on emissions standards to be based on a full life-cycle analysis. including land use changes. (The striker also provided more options for how utilities can spend the half of their credits from providing electricity for transportation that aren’t required to go to transportation electrification projects. Under it, they could have used the money from these to offset increases in their own fuel costs or to invest in a wide variety of other carbon reduction projects, and could have chosen to use up to 10% of it on rate reductions for low-income households.

Changes in the House
The minor technical changes made to the original HB1110 by amendments in the House Environment & Energy Committee are summarized on pp. 7-8 of the House Bill Report. The second substitute added an exemption for some military fuel as well as provisions about renewable hydrogen, and made the entire bill null and void if it didn’t receive specific funding in the omnibus appropriations act by June 30th, 2019.

The floor amendments:

Exempt fuels in off-road logging, mining, construction, and the dyed special fuel in agricultural operations from greenhouse gas intensity requirements until 2028, but allow them to earn credits;
Prohibit awarding credits for fuels from palm oil;
Require consideration of land-use changes in calculating the carbon intensity of fuels from sugar cane;
Allow awarding of credits for a wide variety of activities that “support the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions associated with transportation” including oil carbon capture and sequestration projects, direct air capture, charging vehicles with zero emission electricity; zero emission refueling infrastructure, and smart charging technology. (Apparently, some of these credits are directly tied to how much you invest, not to demonstrating actual reductions as a result of the investments.);
Require estimating and announcing annually the costs or cost savings per gallon of gasoline attributable to the clean fuels program; and,
Specify that hydroelectricity, including power from incremental efficiency improvements, counts as a zero emissions fuel under the bill.

2020 History –
According to the staff summary, the striker in the Senate committee makes the program contingent on the passage of a transportation act with at least $2 billion in new funding and a plan and funding to replace the I-5 bridge over the Columbia and the US-2 trestle (which happens to be in the district of Senator Hobbs, the chair of the Senate Transportation Committee.) It delays the start of the program for a year, or until the required transportation funding is obtained. It adds a renewable fuels facility capable of producing more than 100 million gallons of renewable energy products a year to the list of projects of statewide significance that are eligible for expedited approval. It shifts the required reinvestment of 30% of utilities’ credits revenue from areas with poor air quality to “highly impacted communities”, and allows (but doesn’t explicitly require) Ecology to evaluate transportation fuels using a third-party screening protocol that assesses its associated social, environmental, or labor impacts. (It doesn’t say what the impact or consequences of the assessment are supposed to be, so the point of this provision isn’t clear…)

Comments –

The Puget Sound Clean Air Agency is considering adopting a Regional Clean Fuel Standard for King, Pierce, Kitsap, and Snohomish Counties. (People say it announced it would do this, but their website doesn’t say that yet.) (Presumably, this motivated Senator Hobbs to add “local agencies” to the poison pill provisions in his new transportation proposal – SB5971. (One of these altered sections starts on p. 54, line 5, if you’re interested.)

Governor Inslee’s budget proposal provides $959,000 for the Department of Ecology to implement the program (though his policy brief provided $1.4 million for it.)

Rep. Fitzgibbon’s LCFS bill, HB 2338, which passed out of the House Environment and House Transportation committees last session, would have created a standard at the same level. Carbon Wa’s testimony in support of that bill included quite a bit of useful analysis.

There’s a comparison of the bill and the California and Oregon programs here.

Climate Solutions has produced a flyer supporting the bill, and an FAQ responding to the main attacks on the bill.

Details :

Standards –

Must be based on a full lifecycle analysis of the emissions associated with each fuel, including its production, storage, transportation, and combustion, as well as associated changes in land use.
Must measure the emissions from electricity for each electric utility based on its mix of power sources.
Ecology can require additional reporting from fuel distributors and utilities if it’s needed.
The department may create additional exemptions to avoid mismatched incentives among programs, fuel shifting among markets, or other unintended consequences.
It must decide whether or not emissions reductions under the clean fuels program will count toward meeting the requirements of the clean air rule, and vice versa.

Ecology can create an entity to aggregate and use credits for emissions reductions made by parties that choose not to participate in the credit market.

– Electric utility reinvestments

Half the revenue from credits earned by an electric utility must be reinvested it transportation electrification projects, and 60% of that (30% of the total) must be spent on projects in places where air pollution is bad enough so they’ve been identified as non-attainment or maintenance areas under the National Air Quality Act. Ecology may adopt requirements for the reinvestment of the other half of this revenue, in consultation with the utilities.

– Reporting

Requires an annual report about the program on Ecology’s website, and an annual report to appropriate committees of the Legislature, starting in 2022, with draft legislation for any recommended changes to achieve the program’s goals more efficiently.

Requires a fuel supply forecast by Commerce, in consultation with Ecology and the Department of Agriculture, at least 90 days in advance of each compliance period; this must include a prediction about whether sufficient credits from low carbon fuels (and banked will be available to meet the program’s requirements.

The Joint Legislative Audit Committee must report to the Legislature on the impacts, costs and benefits of the first five years of the program before the end of 2027.

SB5044

SB5043 – Authorizes putting measures that would cancel any of the Sound Transit taxes in a county on its ballot by petition.
Prime Sponsor – Senator O’Ban (R, 24th District, Southern Pierce County)
Current status – Referred to Transportation Committee. Still in committee by 2019 cutoff; reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

– Authorizes a county’s voters to opt out of all the funding sources in the Sound Transit expansion package approved by regional voters in 2016, and apparently also to opt out of any other previous Sound Transit funding measures.

My Comments:
Here’s the results of the 2016 vote, compared with the boundaries of Senator O’Ban’s district. (The green areas at the bottom of the voting results map are the military bases in the southwest area of the district.)

Whatever its other virtues, the expansion is a very expensive way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. (Sound Transit estimates that most of the riders will be people who would have been riding buses otherwise, rather than people shifting to light rail from cars.) The Washington Policy Center pointed out that Sound Transit’s estimates for the planned extension from Northgate to Lynwood imply a cost of $612/metric ton of anticipated reductions, without considering emissions from construction or operating costs. (They did not take account of the value of the other benefits that the expansion will produce, like savings in commuter time; those might be what the money’s paying for, and the CO2 reductions might just be icing on the cake.) KUOW reported the additional emissions from construction steel and concrete.

Details:
Would require the signatures of 8% of the voters in the last election for Governor to put a measure on the ballot.

SB5043

SB5043 – Authorizes putting measures that would cancel future Sound Transit taxes in a county, and/or the current car tab, car rental, and property taxes, on its ballot by petition.
Prime Sponsor – Senator O’Ban (R, 24th District, Southern Pierce County)
Current status – Referred to Transportation Committee. Still in committee by 2019 cutoff; reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

– Authorizes a county’s voters to opt out of the car tab tax, taxes on car rentals, and the property tax approved as part of the regional Sound Transit expansion package in 2016, and to vote to opt out of other future Sound Transit funding measures.

Details:
Would require the signatures of 8% of the voters in the last election for Governor to put a measure on the ballot.

SB5042

SB5042 – Base car tab fees for Sound Transit expansion funding on Kelley Blue Book or national automobile dealers’ association values.
Prime Sponsor – Senator O’Ban (R, 24th District, Southern Pierce County)
Current status – Scheduled for a hearing in the Senate Committee on Transportation, February 26th at 1:30. Still in committee by 2019 cutoff; reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session.
Next step would be – Action by the committee.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

My Comments:
The $54 Billion Sound Transit expansion package voters passed in 2016 included about $8 Billion in funding from an increase in car tab fees. The measure based the fees on the older of the existing valuation systems, which produced large increases from the previous year, and a lot of complaints. Last year, bills to reduce the fees in two different ways passed the Senate (SB5955) and the House (HB2201) with large majorities, but nothing reached the Governor.

Whatever its other virtues, the expansion is an expensive way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. (Sound Transit estimates that most of the riders will be people who would have been riding buses otherwise, rather than people shifting to light rail from cars.) The Washington Policy Center pointed out that Sound Transit’s estimates for the planned extension from Northgate to Lynwood imply a cost of $612/metric ton of anticipated reductions, without considering emissions from construction or operating costs. (They did not take account of the value of the other benefits that the expansion will produce, like savings in commuter time; those might be what the money’s paying for, and the CO2 reductions might just be icing on the cake.) KUOW reported the additional emissions from construction steel and concrete.

SB5037

SB5037 – Would require Sound Transit to get additional voter approval if the cost to complete the expansion plan approved in 2016 increases beyond $54 Billion; if any projects are added or subtracted; or if there are any significant changes in the scope of the project from the approved plan.
Prime Sponsor – Senator O’Ban (R, 24th District, Southern Pierce County)
Current status – Referred to Transportation Committee. Still in committee by 2019 cutoff; reintroduced and retained in present status for 2020 session.
Next step would be – Scheduling a hearing.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.

Comments:
This would make additional votes very likely. Here’s the results of the 2016 vote, compared with the boundaries of Senator O’Ban’s district. (The green areas at the bottom of the voting results map are the military bases in the southwest area of the district.)

Details:
Requires an independent audit when 80% of the voted funding has been used, and another vote if the audit concludes the original plan cannot be completed with the remaining original funding, as well as a vote for additions or deletions of projects, or for “significant” changes in scope.