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Republicans Try to Save Renewable Energy Tax Incentive

Politics, This Washington   March 6, 2010 at 6:21 pm Josh Feit

Environmental advocates lost one and won one in Olympia today as the state Senate took up amendments to its $890 million revenue package.

The Loss: The Senate passed Democratic Sen. Phil Rockefeller’s (D-23) proposal to limit the sales tax exemption for renewable energy projects. Rolling back the exemption, which applied to things like wind power projects and had just been renewed last year, was worth about $7.8 million to the state.

An amendment to stop the Senate from curtailing the green tax exemption was sponsored by a Republican, Sen. Jim Honeyford (R-15), but it lost 24-23 with only five Democrats in support. No Seattle Democrats voted to preserve the renewable energy exemption.

While it may seem strange to see the GOP line up with the hippie environmentalists (after all, it was Democratic Gov. Chris Gregoire who extended the tax last year), the GOP tried to save the tax break today because most of the renewable energy projects are in central and eastern Washington, GOP turf like Sen. Honeyford’s 15th district, just south of Yakima.

The Win (and this one played out along more traditional Democrat and Republican lines): The Senate rejected GOP Sen. Dale Brandland’s (R-42) amendment to preserve a coal industry tax break, approving Democratic Sen. Eric Oemig’s (D-45) proposal to end the $4 million tax break for TransAlta’s coal-fired power plant in Centralia—the largest single-source of greenhouse gas pollution in the state.

Note: The Senate will vote on the revenue package as a whole tomorrow, including the 0.3 percent sales tax which survived an amendment by Republican Sen. Jenea Holmquist (R-13) to take the sales tax out of the revenue plan.




  • an energy guy

    Fact check? – I think the Centralia plant is the largest point source of GHG, but the transportation sector is the largest GHG contributor in the state.

  • Josh Feit

    Right—largest single-source ghg polluter in the state. Thanks. I'll fix that.

  • heatherweiner

    According to the Sierra Club, the TransAlta plant emits the greenhouse gas equivalent of 1.5 million large or 2.0 million medium sized cars each year – so TransAlta is single handedly contributing 10% of Washington's total greenhouse gas emissions. Not to mention the toxin mercury landing in the soil, lakes and rivers around Mt. Rainier NP from the coal-fired plant.

    Shout out to the Senators who spoke up on the floor in favor of limiting the tax break for the foreign-owned TransAlta: Chris Marr, Lisa Brown, Phil Rockefeller, Randy Gordon, Rosa Franklin, Debbie Regala, Adam Kline and the always fabulous Joe McDermott.

  • Confused

    It looks to me like Senator Honeyford’s amendment would have removed the whole section relating to the Sales and Use Tax Exemptions, not just the one that would limit them. If this is true, he’s not exactly a hero. Did I miss something?

  • Jessica Finn Coven

    Sen. Honeyford's amendment (amendment #326) would have taken out the entire section 17 from the bill, which is the specific section that limits the clean energy tax incentive. Most of the wind projects in the state are in rural areas, creating many family-wage jobs and in some cases providing rural counties with their single largest source of property tax revenues, which is likely the main reason Sen. Honeyford and other rural Republicans supported an amendment to maintain this incentive in full. This small clean energy incentive is very good for the state, let's hope the House acts to maintain it.

  • http://twitter.com/fattailed fattailed

    charming that the enviros are trying to play “my tax exemption is better than yours”.

  • Clara

    Look – I-937 already requires utilities to invest in renewable energy resource – so the goal of a greater percentage of our energy resources being renewable is already being met. There is no need to put icing on the frosting of the cake – especially when the choice is to cut social and environmental programs in order to make up the revenue difference.

    And besides – if the state wants to use tax breaks to provide more incentives for clean energy – wouldn't it make more sense to apply them to energy efficiency where a lot more energy can be had at less cost than another wind turbine or solar panel? (Why should a tax break be offered for something that is required by law?)

    Props for the legislators – it's a fair trade. Ditch the coal tax break, ditch the renewable tax break. And besides, without the tax break for renewables it makes keeping I-937 INTACT that much more important – are you listening Senators?

  • http://www.kingcashgold.com sell jewelry

    Shout out to the Senators who spoke up on the floor in favor of limiting the tax break for the foreign-owned TransAlta: Chris Marr, Lisa Brown, Phil Rockefeller, Randy Gordon, Rosa Franklin, Debbie Regala, Adam Kline and the always fabulous Joe McDermott.

  • http://www.taxreliefcheckcoming.com/ Best Tax Relief Companies

    Can anyone tell me who is the best tax relief company for problems with the IRS & State Agencies?
    I have a tax lien with the IRS, but now the state is coming back and looking at an old IRS audit and I need help.

  • http://www.solarenergysystems.com Solar Power For Homes

    Its ashame that the vote lost by such a small amount.