Authors’ update, March 12, 2026: The Washington legislature has passed SB 6355, which establishes a state transmission authority.

One month after unprecedented floods surged across Washington, forcing tens of thousands of people to flee their homes, lawmakers will convene in Olympia to discuss climate policy. This latest climate change-fueled disaster, in an ever-extending string of them, is yet another reminder of what is at stake. 

Washington’s climate ambitions hang on poles and wires. Electric transmission lines make it possible to carry cheap, efficient, reliable power from solar fields in California or wind farms in Montana to the people in Washington who rely on it every day. Without more grid capacity, the state risks relying for longer on polluting and increasingly expensive natural gas for electricity.  

Yet, Washington is only reviewing one (controversial) large transmission project. Meanwhile, the US federal administration is cutting support for the grid despite its claims to the contrary.  

Washington lawmakers can step up, including in the 2026 legislative session. They can empower the state to partner with experienced developers to build lines no one else will, saving ratepayers money. They can eliminate duplicative steps in project review processes, while preserving Tribal consultation rights and opportunities for public feedback. And they can ensure that local jurisdictions do not arbitrarily block or slow crucial projects. The alternative is sticking Washingtonians with an aging grid, which they will pay for in higher bills and forgone opportunities for clean, reliable power.  

1. Empower WA to advance grid projects that utilities and BPA will not 

Washington has few tools to build the transmission it needs. At present, the state is wholly at the mercy of individual utilities and the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA), an independent agency of the US Department of Energy. The last major expansion of the transmission grid in Washington occurred a decade ago, when BPA energized three new 500 kilovolt lines. (One reason for the slow build-out, as Sightline has explained, is these entities do not want to pay for these large projects.)   

A state transmission authority would transform Washington from a hopeful observer to a proactive leader of its decarbonization journey.  

The authority would identify grid projects that Washington needs that neither utilities nor BPA want or plan to develop. It could then partner with experienced private transmission builders to erect the lines. And, if the legislature granted it revenue bonding power, it could build these lines more cheaply than private utilities, which in part rely on expensive equity to finance capital projects. Plus, unlike private utilities, the authority would not profit from grid projects. A recent study found that, in California, transmission projects financed with low-cost public debt could cost 57 percent less than projects financed by investor-owned utilities. Cheaper power lines mean lower monthly utility bills for customers. 

Lawmakers can look to New Mexico, Colorado, and California for guidance.  

• New Mexico’s transmission authority, which the legislature established in 2007, is developing 1,500 miles of transmission lines, with at least two lines under construction. It partners with private developers, such as NextEra Energy and Pattern Energy, to build them, and then leases or sells them to utilities or transmission companies. Revenues from projects New Mexico’s authority develops cover its operating expenses. 

• Colorado’s transmission authority, which the legislature created in 2021, determined in its 2024 study that utilities’ plans to expand the grid fell short of what the state needs; to decarbonize, the state requires more than 500 additional miles of high-voltage wires. The authority is now in discussions with potential partners to develop six priority projects to fill this gap.  

• And in 2025, California enacted a major transmission policy, which, among other provisions, facilitates public debt financing and public ownership of grid projects with the goal of saving ratepayers money. While the bill doesn’t create a transmission authority per se, it lets existing public entities in California perform many of the same functions.  

Washington lawmakers considered but ultimately declined to create a state transmission authority in 2025. With grid constraints showing no signs of letting up, this idea is worth a second look.   

2. Eliminate trial-like hearings for clean grid projects, while preserving Tribal privacy   

All large transmission lines in Washington must undergo environmental and land use review by the state’s siting and permitting agency, the Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council (EFSEC), prior to construction.¹ Yet decades-old procedural requirements that the legislature placed on EFSEC threaten to slow approval of future grid expansion projects in Washington.  

Lawmakers created EFSEC in 1970 and at the same time required the council to hold an adjudicative hearing for every project it reviewed.² An adjudicative hearing is a formal, often adversarial, trial-like proceeding in which parties offer testimony under oath and lawyers can cross-examine witnesses. A year later, in 1971, lawmakers enacted SEPA, which then established its own separate public hearing and comment requirements.  

Today, Washington law requires that EFSEC hold an adjudicative hearing for any project that is inconsistent with local land use ordinances and/or that receives a determination of significance under the State Environmental Policy Act (SEPA). EFSEC’s adjudicative hearings have added from three months to nearly 3.5 years to project reviews.³ The “greatest wildcard is the adjudicative process,” an EFSEC representative told Sightline off the record.  

Without counting adjudicative hearings, the public can weigh in on EFSEC-reviewed projects at least twice and up to three times. As a result, EFSEC may review the same issues and hear repeated comments or concerns from the same parties multiple times. For example, parties to the eight-month-long Wild Horse Wind project adjudicative hearing presented testimony about the visual impacts of the project, including whether the turbines would have a semi-gloss or full-gloss finish; these questions were also reviewed (and mitigation measures identified) in the final EIS.  

In 2018, EFSEC asked the legislature for the power to waive adjudicative hearings if no “genuine issues of fact” existed after SEPA review, but lawmakers declined to adopt a bill that would have done so. The legislature again considered, but did not adopt, a bill in 2025 that would have reserved adjudicative hearings for issues of land use inconsistency only.  

Lawmakers can aim higher in 2026 by broadening the types of projects eligible for EFSEC’s expedited processing, a review path that avoids the adjudicative hearing altogether. At present, a transmission project is unlikely to meet the expedited process’s criterion that a project comply with local land use codes in every jurisdiction it crosses.⁴  

Before implementing any of these changes, though, policymakers need to consult with Tribes and find a way to preserve one of the main, and likely unintended benefits, that adjudicative hearings offer: a space for Tribes to privately share sensitive information without putting it on the public record. Making public the locations of sacred sites, first foods, or archaeological sites, for example, could risk their looting, vandalism, or destruction.  

EFSEC’s adjudicative hearings in the Horse Heaven wind, solar, and battery project allowed the Yakama Nation to influence the project design EFSEC initially recommended to the governor without compromising the confidentiality of sensitive information. (The Yakama Nation continues to oppose the project, suing then-Governor Jay Inslee in 2024 over his approval of a revised design.) By contrast, all information shared in public hearings, including SEPA-related hearings, must be made public according to Washington law.  

3. Trade parochial zoning rules for statewide benefits  

Transmission projects that do not meet the criteria for EFSEC review must instead receive approval from every city or county they cross. A hypothetical 30-mile line from Olympia to Tacoma, for example, would need approval from the cities of Dupont, Lacey, Lakewood, Olympia, Tacoma, plus Pierce and Thurston Counties.  

But permissiveness of transmission projects varies widely across Washington, opening the door for local jurisdictions to block or slow approval of clean energy infrastructure critical to the state. (Transmission projects eligible for EFSEC review do not need local land use permits, but the Council may still impose local land use and zoning criteria onto the state site certificate it issues.) 

Consider a few examples: Island County does not allow transmission lines in several rural zones. Kittitas County and Whatcom County are among the many jurisdictions that require conditional use permits for electric transmission facilities.⁵ Approval criteria for a conditional use permit is often vague and subjective, such as a facility’s consistency with “neighborhood character.”⁶  

As further evidence of the apparent randomness of transmission line land use rules, Snohomish County and Kitsap County expressly allow transmission lines in all zones. Spokane County falls somewhere in the middle, allowing transmission facilities as “limited uses” in all zones, but imposing a height restriction of 125 feet.⁷  

In one of the few recent examples of transmission development in Washington, it took Puget Sound Energy between one and four-and-a-half years for each conditional use permit for the Energize Eastside project: Bellevue (for the south phase of the project) took one year and nine months, Bellevue (for the north phase) took two years and nine months, Newcastle took four years and six months, Redmond took one year and one month, and Renton took two years and one month. These delays drove up the project costs by millions of dollars, which PSE’s customers are now paying.  

At a minimum, the state could prevent local jurisdictions from outright prohibiting transmission facilities in any zones. One way to do this is by clarifying that transmission lines meet the definition of an “essential public facility” in Washington’s Growth Management Act, which prevents comprehensive plans and development regulations from precluding the siting of such facilities.  

Or lawmakers could prohibit cities and counties from requiring conditional use permits, thus removing the possibility of a lengthy administrative hearing and imposition of vague decision-making criteria like “neighborhood character.”  

But given the urgency of Washington’s grid constraints, lawmakers would be smart to simply require cities and counties to allow transmission lines in all or most zones. (Transmission lines would still be subject to all state and federal environmental and safety regulations.) Senate Bill 559, which requires local jurisdictions to permit daycare facilities in all zones except industrial ones and open spaces, could serve as inspiration. In tandem, Washington could develop statewide siting standards for transmission lines that counties could adopt. An analogous example: in 2023, Illinois set statewide standards for siting wind and solar projects; counties can adopt less, but not more, restrictive standards in their zoning codes.  

4. Exempt environmental review for unlikely impacts 

Washington requires SEPA review for any transmission project in the state, a process that takes on average 27 months for actions requiring an EIS.⁸ However, transmission lines are unlikely to affect all elements of the environment reviewed under SEPA. For example, the city of Bellevue found the Energize Eastside project would have no significant impact on five SEPA elements (energy and natural resources, noise, public services, transportation, and utilities).  

Furthermore, EFSEC already requires all projects to meet environmental standards, which overlap in large part with four SEPA elements: 1) air, 2) animals, 3) noise, and 4) water. EFSEC’s standards outline mitigation measures based on state and federal regulations. For example, EFSEC’s air quality standard requires that all energy facilities comply with state and federal clean air laws. It’s hard to imagine a power line causing air pollution that exceeds these levels.   

Washington could direct EFSEC to exempt some or all of the overlapping categories from SEPA review for transmission lines, perhaps leveraging the agency’s recent programmatic environmental impact statement (PEIS) to update the standards if needed to ensure they include adequate mitigation measures.  

EFSEC could also create new standards and objective mitigation criteria to replace other SEPA environmental elements on which power lines are likely to cause minimal disturbance, such as public services, utilities, or transportation. Relying on clear standards would improve predictability of the permitting processes, still hold projects to all relevant state and federal regulations, and preserve SEPA review for the elements most likely to be affected, like historic and cultural preservation.   

Meanwhile, the state could expand an existing SEPA exemption for grid upgrades (like reconductoring) to include lines rated above 115 kilovolts and for projects that would widen existing rights-of-way on previously disturbed lands. EFSEC’s PEIS found upgrades’ impact on the environment is akin to routine operations and maintenance of power lines. This exemption, which the legislature considered in 2025, would mirror a 2024 Biden administration change to the National Environmental Policy Act.  

Again, though, the legislature would need to consult with Tribes to preserve Tribal rights currently protected by SEPA and avoid repeating devastating consequences of the Pacific Northwest’s last big energy infrastructure build-out, with hydropower dams flooding burial grounds, displacing communities, and decimating fish populations, among other lasting harms.  

State lawmakers can help Washingtonians connect to cleaner, cheaper electricity 

Washington is overdue in expanding grid capacity. Action by the legislature in 2026 to create a transmission authority and accelerate the permitting process—while protecting Tribal consultation—will unclog development. The sooner Washington acts, the better positioned the state will be to increase the flow of clean energy and limit unnecessary energy bill bloat for Washingtonians.  

Related: The High Cost of Slow Permitting | Sluggish approval of Cascadian transmission projects inflates electricity bills and strands renewable energy.