Rep. Alex Ramel (D – Bellingham) is the House Deputy Majority Whip and a member of the House Environment and Energy Committee, and was appointed to the legislature in Jan. 2020. As a graduate of Western Washington University’s Huxley College, Ramel was called to public service to help address the climate and housing crises facing current and future generations.
Ramel is the prime sponsor on two environmental policy bills that are scheduled to be heard in the Senate Environment, Energy & Technology Committee Thursday at 10:30 a.m. In this Q&A, he talks about the bills and why the clean energy solution to a problem is sometimes cheaper.
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Sydney Kurle: Can you give me context for HB 1280? What made you introduce the bill? What does it do?
Rep. Alex Ramel: “I was actually contacted by folks here in Bellingham, who knew that I was interested in reducing greenhouse gas pollution in the building sector. And they said, ‘Hey, you’ve got to be thinking about this school district, they’re working on a major remodel, and they’re going to install a new gas furnace. And not only is it going to cost more, but it’s going to be a commitment to decades of continuing to burn gas in buildings. You’ve got to do something about it.’ Yeah, the legislature doesn’t actually run the school district, but I just called and asked a couple of questions to try and understand. And in the process, when I talked to the facilities manager, he said, ‘Oh, yeah, I’ve talked to them. I’m actually doing some research.’ And he went and did his homework. And he found out that if you put in a high-efficient all-electric clean heat pump, it would actually operate more smoothly. It’s going to be more reliable for maintenance issues. And it would actually save the school district money. And it was just a matter of really going and getting a bid and doing all work. And once he had done that, it was an easy case to make.
And so, really, the impetus for the bill is encouraging other school districts and other government facilities to really just do that evaluation at the outset. It doesn’t require those changes. They already have to do a lifecycle energy cost analysis. So it doesn’t actually make their job any more difficult. And it can provide some valuable information that can help them make a decision. That’s not only better for the climate, but at least in this one case, it sounds like it’s going to save them a fair amount of money.”
SK: What about HB 1287?
AR: So we spent the last year in state government talking with legislators, energy industry stakeholders and advocates and coming up with our state energy strategy. To meet our climate goals, to meet our energy reliability, growing population, making sure that our energy costs remain affordable, trying to put all of those pieces together for the next 30 years so that we can meet all of those challenges head on. And this bill just came out of conversations that happened during one of those meetings. The electric utility representative said it would be helpful for them to have a consistent set of planning goals coming from the state. And that they didn’t know how many electric vehicles to plan for. And they were kind of coming up with their own estimates, but they didn’t really have the best way to model. And so this is just a way to help those folks who are responsible for planning our infrastructure decades in advance of when we actually need it. [This bill is a way] to make sure they have the planning tools. When we know that our energy use in the transportation sector has just shifted dramatically.
We know that vehicles are moving increasingly towards electric, there’s more and more of them on the street right now. But I think we’re probably underestimating, many of us underestimate, how fast that transition is going to happen. The day we had the first committee hearing on this bill, General Motors announced that by 2035, they weren’t going to be making internal combustion engines. That’s 15 years from now, and we need to build a lot of vehicle charging stations in garages and parking lots. We need to make sure that there’s wires installed in places, and to put more of them in as people need them. So you don’t have to sort of tear up the concrete or go into the walls every time you want to put a new charging station. And we need that infrastructure in buildings. And then we need the electric utilities, ready to supply that electricity to have the line capacity, the substations and the generating capacity. So this is all of those pieces, and a consistent set of planning goals and standards, to be able to do all of that in a way that’s coordinated, and looking ahead.
SK: Both of these bills passed either along party lines or very close to party lines in the House. How are you working to ensure that you have at least the same success in the Senate?
AR: Well, I would say HB 1287 actually got, I think, fairly broad bipartisan support. We got a number of Republicans, including the Transportation Committee Chair, who I think recognizes that this is coming. But we’re not mandating a change, right? Where we run into problems or disagreements across party lines is when we require changes to happen. This is just saying, ‘Hey, look at the market changes are coming. Let’s get ready for it.’ So that’s the case that I have been trying to make. And I think you’ve got a number of Republicans ready to come along with us and hope to have similar success on the Senate side.
And I’ll be honest, I was surprised that we didn’t get more bipartisan support on HB 1280. It, again, doesn’t require anyone to do anything other than take a look at an alternative design. And see if it makes sense. It costs no money at all, the fiscal note on that bill is zero. So I would have thought that was a bill that could get more support. I actually do have a call scheduled with a member of the Senate Energy, Environment and Technology Committee this evening, in advance of that hearing, to see if I can talk a couple of Republicans into taking a second look at it. Especially with a bill that doesn’t get a lot of scrutiny, folks might vote based on just what the bill title says and not really look at the details. I think if you look at the details, this is one that warrants bipartisan support.”
SK: Opponents of renewable energy and clean energy policy often call them too expensive, what is your rebuttal to that?
AR: Well, again, on the buildings and facilities bill [HB 1280], what we’re asking people to do is take a look, because the evidence that I’ve seen is that it will save money. That the status quo is actually the more expensive way to go. And on the vehicle bill [HB 1287], I would say that the costs of not being prepared are far more expensive than the costs of preparing. And I think the example that I would use is I live in a multifamily building, a condo. It would be tens of thousands of dollars to install electric vehicle charging infrastructure in the garage because there are no wires. But if you were building a new building, it is far less expensive to put the wires in place so that you’re ready for the charging infrastructure that you need. We’d have to tear out asphalt and perhaps put in new circuits, etcetera, etcetera. Doing that stuff when you’re building the building to be ready [for the future] is far more cost effective. And so I would say that the cost of not being ready, of not being prepared, is way less expensive than the cost of getting ready.”
This interview has been edited for clarity and length.
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