The Virginia House of Delegates on Tuesday voted to require the state's return to the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) covering northeastern US power plant emissions.
The House voted 63-35, largely along party lines, to pass HB 397, a bill that would direct the Department of Environmental Quality to put into effect regulations to rejoin the 11-state CO2 cap-and-trade program.
The bill, introduced last month by House majority leader Charniele Herring (D), now moves to the state Senate Committee on Agriculture, Conservation and Natural Resources for consideration.
Senate lawmakers are at the same time considering a nearly identical bill, known as SB 802, which was cleared by the Senate Finance and Appropriations Committee with a 10-5 vote today. In addition, lawmakers introduced budget amendments last month that would require state officials to repeal the regulation that enabled Virginia's exit from RGGI in 2023. The amendments also would direct regulators to revise Virginia's CO2 trading regulations to align with the changes RGGI states agreed to last summer by no later than January 2027.
Virginia's reentry could bring a large source of demand into the RGGI market, in which allowance prices have risen considerably since the state exited the initiative. The state boasts the largest data center market globally, accounting for about 35pc of the world's hyperscale data centers, contributing to Virginia's surging electricity demand.
But the impact of Virginia's return to RGGI depends on how it negotiates certain issues, such as its initial allowance allocation, with the other member states. Governor Abigail Spanberger's (D) administration has not yet elaborated on how it plans to work with the RGGI states to rejoin the program.
But her administration has made clear that it intends to begin the process of rejoining RGGI as soon as possible.
"Our Department of Environmental Quality is ready, willing, able and prepared to be able to fully reenter RGGI as soon as we have authorization by the General Assembly and the governor to do so," said David Bulova, secretary of natural and historic resources, during a Senate committee hearing last week.
