OPINION: Voters saved WA’s climate law at a critical time

This editorial was published in The Seattle Times.

Though Donald Trump’s return to the presidency bodes poorly for national climate policy, Washington voters trounced Initiative 2117, protecting the state’s landmark climate law aimed at curbing heat-trapping greenhouse gas emissions. In what is sure to be a void of federal leadership in tackling a pressing global crisis, voters gave a mandate to continue this critical work.

But lawmakers in Olympia would be wise to digest what provoked the initiative in the first place: an initial lack of transparency about Washington’s Climate Commitment Act and its impact on gas prices. Gov.-elect Bob Ferguson and the Legislature must assure residents the state’s young carbon market is well managed and effective in reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

More than 60% of Washington voters affirmed the 2021-passed Climate Commitment Act, a vote of faith in the nascent program. And one that lawmakers must prove they deserve.

The CCA created a cap-and-trade auction market for the state’s largest polluters. The premise is simple: Pay for what you emit — or find ways to reduce your emissions. And if emitters pay, the money goes to programs that further reduce emissions or make the state more resilient in an era of rising temperatures and sea levels. The vote’s result is ushering in a greener economy: fleets of electric ferries, buses and cars, a cleaner power grid and free transit for youth — the latter is the only such state program in the country.

This state’s leadership gives others the chance to come alongside. Quebec and California, for example, have agreed to merge their respective carbon markets with Washington’s, which should make auction prices less volatile across the jurisdictions. Other states could follow suit.

Surging gas prices in the summer of 2023, the first year of the carbon auctions, boosted the signature-gathering effort that put I-2117 on the ballot. There was genuine anger that polluters such as oil refineries were passing costs along at the pump, and Gov. Jay Inslee did not help matters by minimizing the impact of the new cap-and-trade system on motorists. It did not just cost “pennies,” as he said. State officials should ensure the cost of participating in the cap-and-trade market’s auctions does not surge to the level those participants pass on costs to the consumer to untenable levels.

By the time Washingtonians cast their ballots last week, following a thorough and well-funded “no” campaign bridging business, unions, tribes and others, the outcry over gas prices appeared to have whimpered out. It didn’t hurt that gas prices had fallen at least a dollar per gallon since the summer of 2023. More than six in 10 voters didn’t buy Redmond hedge fund manager Brian Heywood’s campaign to “vote yes, pay less.”

Instead, they voted no to keep the cash flowing to the cause of fighting climate change.

The Biden administration has emphasized incentives for shifting to a cleaner, more electrified economy. The Democrats passed the Inflation Reduction Act, the largest raft of federal funding for climate in the country’s history. Yet even Biden and his staff were reticent to attempt a carbon-pricing scheme. That political courage had to come from the states — and the gold standard may just turn out to be Washington’s.

That standard can only be set if Ferguson and the Legislature are willing to make the Climate Commitment Act better by ensuring transparency and accountability metrics.

The state’s latest Greenhouse Gas Inventories — critical to assess the success of bringing down emissions in the coming years — are from 2019. That lag in reporting results is too long. The Legislature should also find ways to increase auditing of programs paid for by the act, to verify they cut emissions or are sufficiently readying Washington for increased wildfire, flooding and other climate-caused challenges.

Lawmakers must also uphold a promise to the state’s farmers, who are exempted from fuel cost increases under the act. They can also look for ways to help distribute some auction proceeds to the state’s poorest residents, to ensure it is not an unfair burden. This year, the state’s Department of Commerce distributed $200 energy rebates to nearly 700,000 households. Those rebates should continue and could even be expanded.

With I-2117’s defeat, Washington voters stepped up to fight climate change at the very moment the appetite to do so at the federal level will wane entirely. The state’s aim is net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. Keeping the Climate Commitment Act is the state’s best chance to make that goal. Voters in Washington met the moment.

The next governor and the Legislature can prove they deserve the public’s trust by ensuring the law is transparent, accountable and a touchstone policy other states desire to emulate.

TNS