‘Where does the money go?’: Curley, critics questions use of funds raised by Climate Commitment Act

The Climate Commitment Act (CCA), the law that sets a cap on carbon pollution in the state, has raised billions of dollars since it became finalized in 2023.

Washington is the second state with an economy-wide cap-and-invest program, alongside California. New York is developing a cap-and-invest program for 2026.

“So they take the money from us, and then it goes to the government, and then the government’s going to reduce our CO2,” KIRO host John Curley said. “How much money have they taken from us so far with the Climate Commitment Act?”

“In 2.5 years, they have raised for the CO2 tax just under $4 billion,” Todd Myers, vice president of research at the Washington Policy Center, answered on “The John Curley Show.”

Despite the vast amount of funds, a Washington State Department of Ecology (DOE) report, obtained by The Center Square, revealed only 0.1% of funds raised by the CCA’s Air Quality & Health Disparities Improvement account were spent on supporting air quality projects.

DOE reported that $472 million of CCA funds were spent during the fiscal year 2024. Of that, 0.1% (approximately $596,000) came from the air quality account for two projects.

“If you look at that report from the Department of Ecology, but basically about three-quarters of the projects, three-quarters of the money, and they actually have a column that says, ‘Is there any measurable CO2 reduction?’ Three-quarters of the dollars say that there is zero measurable CO2 reduction from those projects.”

The two projects the CCA’s Air Quality & Health Disparities Improvement account was funding were to reduce air pollutant emissions in overburdened communities highly impacted by air pollution, and to monitor ultra-fine particles by the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency.

Where does the rest of the Climate Commitment Act funds go?

“Where does the money go?” Curley asked. “Follow the money to prove that this is just grift, fraud, abuse.”

“There is definitely some grift,” Myers said. “There was spending that would go to an organization that Governor Inslee’s maritime advisor was in, to look at offshore wind turbine. I think that’s clearly, we’ll call it corruption. But, to his credit, Governor Ferguson vetoed that. So that money, which was in the budget, actually got pulled out.”

Myers said approximately 70% of the money from the CCA goes to more planning and more government.

“That’s really where the money gets spent,” Myers said. “Just hiring more government planners and giving it to local government planning agencies.”

Myers brought a lawsuit against both the Washington Department of Ecology and Commerce, calling on Governor Ferguson and DOE Director Casey Sixkiller to admit the Inslee Administration failed to follow the law and settle the case, rather than waste taxpayers’ money defending the agency’s failure to meet its basic obligations.

“The CO2 tax has been in place since 2023 and we don’t even have any idea about whether it’s working, about whether we’re making progress or not,” Myers said. “The most recent data that we have is three, four years old, so it’s not only just a bad policy, but they’re also violating the law. And when we sued them, they admitted that they’re violating the law, saying [the data] is too hard to collect.

Listen to the full conversation here.

Listen to John Curley weekday afternoons from 3 – 7 p.m. on KIRO Newsradio, 97.3 FM. Subscribe to the podcast here.