Conservationists cheer power plant emissions bills

The bill requires new power plants to offset 20 percent of the carbon dioxide they send into the air through mitigation projects. Such projects could include energy conservation projects, forest preservation or converting diesel-powered buses to natural gas. Power producers can either finance the projects on their own or pay someone else to do it at the rate of $1.60 per ton of carbon dioxide produced. Energy conservation groups hailed the bill as a sign that lawmakers are taking global warming and its effect on the environment, public health and the economy, seriously.

"A year ago, this vote wouldn't have been possible," KC Golden of Olympia-based Climate Solutions told The Olympian. The bill passed the Senate on a 40-6 vote and the House on a 69- 27 vote. It awaits the signature of Gov. Gary Locke, who supported the bill.

Bill LaBorde, of the Northwest Energy Coalition, a Seattle-based energy conservation group, called the bill an improvement over a rule the state Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council was considering because it sets the carbon dioxide payment higher and it covers all power plants 25 megawatts and larger.

The energy council has authority only over plants 350 megawatts and larger. However, the carbon dioxide calculations are based on only 60 percent of a plant's operating capacity, compared with 100 percent in the proposed energy council rule, LaBorde said.

The council and the Department of Ecology will need to draft new rules to implement the bill, energy council project manager Allen Fiksdal noted.

In recent years, the energy siting council has made greenhouse- gas mitigation a condition of approving new power plants on a case- by-case basis.

The bill gives the energy council authority to adjust the carbon dioxide fee every two years, but it only applies to existing power plants if they boost their carbon dioxide emissions 15 percent or more.