Report-WA State Will Fail to Meet 2030 Vehicle Emission Reductions

According to a soon-to-be-released report from the WA state Electric Vehicle Coordinating council,  our state will be woefully short of its 2030 emission reduction goals.

  The state falling short in many areas.

The Council is preparing a report that details 'progress' made towards reducing pollution from the transportation sector. According to state officials, vehicle emissions make up half of the state's greenhouse gases. These are from all vehicles, which make up the transportation sector.

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According to climate goals in its Transportation Electrification Strategy, the idea was to reduce the state's overall greenhouse gases by 45 percent by the year 2030, this group is tasked with reducing them from vehicles.

The state is falling short in numerous areas, enough so it does not appear anywhere close to achieving that goal. Some of the deficiencies include:

• The cost of electric vehicles. Many WA families cannot afford them, as the average cost of one in WA state ranges from $55 to $66,000. According to the website Recurrent Auto, even used EVs can average around $35K.
• Lack of charging stations. In order to meet the state's EV goals, nearly 3 million more charging stations are needed statewide. Currently, there are only about 4,600.
• Lack of use of public transportation. Officials had hoped various publicity and encouragement campaigns would get more people to utilize public transit, but it has not happened. Officials also say COVID had a big effect on ridership.

As part of the Climate Commitment Act pushed by Gov. Inslee and passed by Democrats, the sale of new fossil-fuel vehicles will be banned in WA state by the year 2035.