Photo Caption: Sen. Curtis King (right) receives an award from George Caan, Executive Director of the Washington Public Utility Districts Association.
The Washington Public Utility Districts Association honored King for his leadership in passage of a bill signed last July by Gov. Jay Inslee last April that allows public utility districts to produce and sell renewable natural gas from landfills, wastewater treatment plants, and dairy digesters for use as a transportation fuel; adding value to PUD projects and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The new PUD authority went into effect in July of 2015.
The award, presented to King at the Association’s Jan. 14, 2016 meeting in Olympia, recognizes a Washington State Legislator or Member of Congress that has taken a leadership role in pursuing passage of WPUDA supported legislation or preventing passage of legislation that would negatively impact PUDs. King was the prime sponsor of Senate Bill 5424 in the 2015 session and his leadership played a critical role in passage of the legislation. The bill passed both houses of the legislature unanimously with Rep. Norm Johnson, also from the 14th District, providing leadership in the House to help facilitate passage of the Senate bill.
King’s District (14th) includes Klickitat County, the location of a Klickitat PUD project that uses landfill gas from the Roosevelt Regional Landfill to generate renewable electricity. The legislation allows Klickitat PUD to expand the project to produce and sell renewable natural gas (RNG) as a transportation fuel. When RNG is used as a transportation fuel it displaces gasoline or diesel with a renewable fuel, lowering greenhouse gas emissions. This new authority adds value to the PUD’s project, provides a substantial source of renewable fuel in the state, and reduces greenhouse gas from the transportation fleet, the single largest source of greenhouse gas emissions in Washington.
The legislation also opens the door for Whatcom County PUD to expand their work with dairies in the area to produce and sell renewable natural gas from dairy digesters. Whatcom County is the 10th largest dairy producing county in the country. Whatcom PUD is currently working with Western Washington University and dairies in the county to address their excess dairy gas problem by researching economical methods to convert it to renewable natural gas.
“It was with the support of Sen. King that we were able to take a good idea and develop it into good public policy,” said George Caan, Executive Director of the Washington Public Utility Districts Association. “We are grateful for his dedicated effort to guide this legislation through the process.”
The Washington PUD Association was established in 1936. Its mission is to support, protect and enhance its members’ ability to conserve the power and water resources for the benefit of the people of the State of Washington and provide not-for-profit, locally controlled utility services. Visit https://www.wpuda.org for more information.
Published Feb. 3, 2016. The original article and photo can be viewed here.