HB2311 – Increases the State’s emissions reductions targets beyond the Paris Accords’.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Slatter (D; 48th District; Bellevue, Redmond, & Kirkland)
Current status –
In the House – (Passed)
A substitute bill passed the House Committee on Environment & Energy January 23rd. Referred to the House Committee on Appropriations; had a hearing there February 3rd. Passed out of Appropriations with a very minor amendment February 8th. Referred to Rules February 11th. Passed out of the House with a floor amendment February 16th.

In the Senate – (Passed)
Referred to the Senate Committee on Environment, Energy & Technology. Had a hearing February 20th; passed out of committee February 25th. Referred to Ways and Means; had a hearing there on February 28th. Passed out of committee March 2nd, and referred to Rules. Passed the Senate March 5th.
Next step would be – To the Governor for his signature.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB6272 is a companion bill in the Senate.

Comments –
The bill would raise the State’s targets farther than last session’s HB2313, which has been reintroduced and which would set them to match the Paris Accords’.

The House substitute adds a section about the State’s intent, with items about environmental justice; supporting good jobs and creating economic benefits; and maintaining manufacturing and avoiding leakage. It specifies that the targets are about reducing anthropogenic emissions and includes the tonnes of reductions implied by the percentage targets. The amendment in Appropriations adjusted the language about carbon sequestration and added carbon storage to the goals for State agencies. The floor amendment specifies that agencies don’t have to maximize sequestration in their land-management activities, and only requires DNR to act in in cooperation with the landowners when it is promoting carbon sequestration on the private lands and trust lands that it supervises , not when it’s requiring it.

Summary –
The bill leaves the State’s current greenhouse gas emissions target of a reduction to 1990 levels by 2020 (which we will not meet) in place. It raises the next target from a 25% reduction below 1990 levels by 2035 to a 45% reduction by 2030. It adds a target for 2040 of a 70% reduction, and it increases the target for 2050 from a 50% reduction from 1990 levels to a 95% reduction. It adds a requirement for achieving net-zero emissions state-wide by 2050.

The targets are about reducing the amount of CO2 going into the atmosphere;  they don’t address removing CO2 by increasing sequestration.  However, the bill also says that “separate and apart” from reducing emissions to meet the targets, it’s the policy of the State “to prioritize sequestration activities in amounts necessary to achieve the carbon neutrality goal established in RCW 70.235.020, and at a level consistent with pathways to limit global warming to one and one-half degrees.” It says the State should promote voluntary and incentive based sequestration on natural and working lands and recognize the potential for sequestration in products and product supply chains associated with working lands.   It requires agencies to seek all practical opportunities to cost-effectively maximize carbon sequestration in their operations, contracting, and grant-making activities.

Details –
Commerce’s reports on emissions are now to include those from wildfires.

State agencies’ goals are increased to a 45% reduction below 2005 levels by 2030, a 70% reduction by 2040, a 95% reduction below 2005 levels by 2050, and net zero emissions by state government as a whole by then as well. Agencies are now to report every two years to the efficiency and environmental performance office at the Department of Commerce on their plans for reaching these targets and Commerce is to report to the Legislature on those (and on the budget required to implement them).