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You are here: Home / Washington / Washington State Legislature Considers I-937 Amendments

Washington State Legislature Considers I-937 Amendments

January 31, 2012 By Brittany Quigley

The Washington State Legislature is a full two weeks into its scheduled 60 day 2012 session. While budget issues and gay marriage legislation are grabbing local headlines, there are a number of proposed bills dealing with energy and utilities and a handful of direct interest to the energy efficiency community. NEEC offers a convenient “Bill Tracker” link on the front page of its website [www.neec.net] found in the upper right hand corner of the home page. (Note, that Oregon bills will be tracked from this link when that state’s Legislature convenes – see story below.)

No discussion of Washington energy legislation can go by without discussing proposed changes to the state’s Energy Independence statute (aka I-937). This year is no exception. After this issue paralyzed the Legislature in 2010, there was a hiatus in activity last year with tacit agreement among the stakeholders that I-937 would be addressed in 2012. And addressed it is with more than 12 separate pieces of legislation offering a variety of ways to “fix” the statute. Despite a somewhat more pleasant outward demeanor by interest groups, things don’t appear to have changed all that much. (This certainly is true for NEEC, who remains committed to the notion that I-937 would be improved by allowing energy efficiency acquisitions above a utility’s 2 year target to be used to meet the renewable standard.)

While a number of bills have been introduced that would amend the I-937 renewables requirement (e.g. by allowing hydropower to be counted as a qualifying renewable or waiving the requirement until the power is needed), the more omnibus bill has been introduced by Rep. Dave Upthegrove, Chair of the House Environmental Committee. Bill numbers for the House and Senate companion legislation are HB 2688 and SB 6396. Hearings last week on both bills drew dozens of public comment but very little unanimity – well, actually almost everyone did not support the language in the bill, but just for very different reasons.   
 
Unless some miracle language surfaces soon (rumor that the Governor may introduce her language soon), it is unlikely that anything will occur on this issue, this session. 

Filed Under: Washington

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