SILVERDALE, Washington. Standing at a transit center near four new wireless bus charging stations in a small community west of Seattle, Governor Jay Inslee they told transit and city leaders where the money to pay them came from — more than $1 million.
“It is only possible because of the Climate Commitment Law” said Inslee, citing a program that works to reduce pollution while raising money for investments that address climate change. “That was the source. It’s the only way we can do this.”
Inslee made similar comments while visiting a salmon habitat restoration project and then testing a car from an all-electric cooperative company’s fleet, part of the three-term Democrat’s campaign in recent months to champion a major climate achievement. of his term amid a fierce conservative-led recall effort. Inslee, who is not seeking a fourth term, has participated in more than a dozen projects funded by the law and, in his spare time, has put his name to a flurry of emails, texts and calls to voters.
Behind the recall effort is Let’s Go Washington, a group funded primarily by hedge fund executive Brian Heywood that submitted more than 400,000 signatures from Washingtonians to get a vote on the November ballot. They argue that the law helped increase gas prices, which are currently third largest in the country.
Repeal would scuttle Washington’s plans to link its carbon market with others and could deal a blow to its efforts to help other states launch similar programs. And for Inslee — who put climate at the forefront during his brief 2019 presidential campaign — repeal would be an especially distressing loss.
He talked about a carbon pricing program as soon as he took office, and recommended the Legislature capped emissions in 2014. It wasn’t until 2021, four years after Democrats won control of both legislative chambers, that the CCA was passed and enthusiastically signed by Inslee.
Washington was the second state to launch such a program, after California, with annual targets that start out especially stringent and aim to reduce emissions by nearly half compared to 1990 levels by the year 2030.
In February 2023, the state held its first quarterly auction of emissions permits for companies that emit at least 25,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide or equivalent – also known as C02e. Companies like BP must purchase permits based on their total emissions, with one permit being equivalent to one metric ton of C02e. Every year, available subsidies decrease.
Auctions have raised more than US$2 billionwith the money used for everything from transport to education. Inslee recently announced that $52 million from the program would go to tribes to respond to climate change.
But from the start, the gas price issue irked some Washingtonians. Inslee promised the program would have a negligible effect on gas prices while making huge investments in important climate programs. But the campaign to repeal it claims the CCA increased costs from 43 to 53 cents per gallon, citing the conservative think tank Washington Policy Center. Gasoline has reached $5.12 per gallon since auctions began, although it has hovered around $4.24 this month, according to GasBuddy.
“For Washington state riders, these pennies add up to hundreds of dollars lost to a program that didn’t do what it was advertised to do,” Let’s Go Washington said in a statement in March.
Inslee countered that Washington saw “dramatic swings” in gas prices long before the carbon pricing program, noting that their all-time high of $5.54 occurred several months before the auctions began.
The win-win narrative touted by Inslee is common in the climate movement, said Aseem Prakash, professor of political science and founding director of the environmental policy center at the University of Washington. But it’s not working because it has become increasingly clear that there is a cost to the climate transition, Prakash said.
“He’s making the case for cost… and that’s a losing strategy, because the narrative now is that the Conservatives are saying we told you so, they’re going to tax you,” Prakash said.
For some climate advocates, there is much more at stake in this vote than a single state policy. Washington is in the process of linking its carbon market with California and Quebec, which also hold emission license auctions. This could make the market more stable and could happen as early as next year, said Becky Kelley, senior climate policy advisor at Inslee. Washington is also helping other states in efforts to launch similar programs.
“If this initiative passes here, it would definitely create a freeze and slow down states, perhaps even the country’s action in addressing the climate crisis,” said David Mendoza, director of policy and government relations at The Nature Conservancy in Washington.
State law prohibits the governor’s office from organizing political or campaign events, so Inslee was careful to say he would have appeared in projects funded by the climate law with or without the repeal vote. But it’s clear he cares deeply about the outcome, citing his six grandchildren when asked what repeal would mean for his climate legacy.
“I think of my grandchildren in this sense, this is my legacy. I am proud of this legacy. And I’m committed to giving them a chance,” he said. “And they should have clean air to breathe. They should have salmon in the water. And they shouldn’t have to have wildfires in the future all the time. I care about this. This is how I see this issue, through the eyes of my grandchildren.”
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