Large-emitter reported emissions, 2012-2024

What this dataset measures

Built to check Washington Policy Center and Department of Ecology claims, made in April 2026, about whether the state is on track for its 2030 limit and what drove the 2022 decline. Uses the official inventory, the statute, the utility fuel mix the inventory relies on, federal generation data, and Ecology's large-emitter reports.

Geography

Washington, United States

Unit of observation

State-year (and sector-year or fuel-year)

Update cadence

Updated when Ecology publishes a new inventory (next one due by December 31, 2026).

Curator

FactHub Research Team

Curated data tables

Large-emitter reported emissions, 2012-2024

Yearly sums of reported and covered emissions from Ecology's mandatory reporting program.

Unit of observation: Year

large-emitter-indicator.csv text/csv · 947 bytes

All 13 rows 5 columns Download the file

All 13 rows

year	reported_emissions_mmt_co2e million metric tons CO2e	covered_emissions_mmt_co2e million metric tons CO2e	reporters	scope
2012	27.622434	—	159	facilities and natural gas suppliers only
2013	33.855407	—	160	facilities and natural gas suppliers only
2014	33.791093	—	162	facilities and natural gas suppliers only
2015	40.470909	—	168	facilities and natural gas suppliers only
2016	38.766487	—	171	facilities and natural gas suppliers only
2017	40.340946	—	176	facilities and natural gas suppliers only
2018	39.370803	—	176	facilities and natural gas suppliers only
2019	44.268143	—	176	facilities and natural gas suppliers only
2020	38.86795	—	174	facilities and natural gas suppliers only
2021	38.247142	—	174	facilities and natural gas suppliers only
2022	92.492726	—	259	expanded: adds fuel suppliers and electric power entities
2023	90.789348	64.005277	272	expanded: adds fuel suppliers and electric power entities
2024	90.384659	59.835072	294	expanded: adds fuel suppliers and electric power entities

5 field definitions

Field	Type	Meaning	Units	Value type
year	integer	Reporting year	—	observed
reported_emissions_mmt_co2e	number	Sum of reported_emissions_mtco2e / 1,000,000	million metric tons CO2e	derived
covered_emissions_mmt_co2e	number	Sum of covered emissions under the Climate Commitment Act; blank before 2023 (program began 2023)	million metric tons CO2e	derived
reporters	integer	Number of reporting rows	—	observed
scope	string	Which kinds of reporters are included	—	observed

Supporting files

Source snapshots, manifests, quality reports, documentation, and other materials used to produce or review this release.

• results.json Derived table · application/json · 25.7 KB (26,302 bytes)

  Saved analyses and attributed statements, generated by build.js.

• build.js Transformation manifest · text/javascript · 22.2 KB (22,773 bytes)

  Node.js script that computes every saved analysis from the CSV tables.

• dataset-parts.json Documentation · application/json · 25.6 KB (26,193 bytes)

  Sources, table definitions, replications and limitations for this release, as stored in the dataset content.

Sources

1. Washington Department of Ecology, Washington Greenhouse Gas Inventory: 1990-2022 (publication 26-14-030, April 2026) Official statewide totals, sector values, limits table, and Ecology's statements on schedule and drivers.

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Washington State government publication. Public government document; linked, not rehosted.

   Reliability: Government. Has a stake in this finding. Ecology prepares the inventory under RCW 70A.45.020 and administers the state climate policies it measures. Most sector values come from EPA's State Inventory Tool; electricity uses Commerce fuel mix data.

2. Ecology, Inventory Results 1990-2022 workbook (supplement to publication 26-14-030) Unrounded yearly totals by sector and fuel used for every calculation.

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Washington State government publication. Values copied into annual-emissions.csv and electricity-emissions-by-fuel.csv.

   Reliability: Government. Has a stake in this finding. Same publisher and methods as the inventory report; values match the report's rounded tables.

3. RCW 70A.45.020, Greenhouse gas emissions reductions - Reporting requirements Statutory limits for 2020-2050 and the current reporting deadlines.

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public law. Public law.

   Reliability: Government. Official code text published by the Washington State Legislature, as amended by 2025 c 195.

4. Senate Bill 5036, Chapter 195, Laws of 2025 (as passed) Shows the reporting language before and after the 2025 change (struck and added text).

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public law. Public law.

   Reliability: Government. Enrolled session law; effective July 27, 2025.

5. Final Bill Report, SB 5036 (2025) Nonpartisan staff summary of prior and new reporting rules, including the January 2025 inventory covering data through 2021.

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public legislative document. Public document.

   Reliability: Government. Prepared by nonpartisan legislative staff; not part of the law.

6. Ecology news release, April 24, 2026: New report: Clean energy is powering reductions in Washington's carbon emissions Ecology's public account of the drivers of the 2022 drop.

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Washington State government publication. Linked, not rehosted.

   Reliability: Party to the dispute. Has a stake in this finding. Press release from the agency whose report and policies are being judged.

7. Ecology, GHG Reporting Program Publication (data.wa.gov dataset idhm-59de) Reported and covered emissions of large emitters, 2012-2024, the early indicator for 2023-2024.

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public domain (Washington open data). Yearly sums copied into large-emitter-indicator.csv.

   Reliability: Government. Has a stake in this finding. Entities emitting 10,000 tonnes or more report to Ecology under WAC 173-441; fuel suppliers and electric power entities were added in 2022. Dataset rows were last updated April 24, 2026.

8. Ecology, Tracking greenhouse gases Ecology's statement that large emitters posted a 0.45% decrease from 2023 to 2024.

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Washington State government publication. Linked.

   Reliability: Government. Has a stake in this finding. Agency web page; checks our sum of the large-emitter data.

9. Washington Department of Commerce, CY2022 Washington State Electric Utility Fuel Mix Disclosure Report Aggregate megawatt-hours by fuel for electricity sold to Washington customers, 2000-2022 (Table 2).

   Retrieved November 3, 2026. Washington State government publication. Values copied into utility-fuel-mix.csv.

   Reliability: Government. Compiled by Commerce from reports by more than 60 utilities and BPA under RCW 19.29A; the inventory's electricity sector is built from it. The report header reads 2023 fuel mix disclosure report, for report year 2022.

10. U.S. Energy Information Administration, Electric Power Operational Data (API v2), Washington, all sectors, annual net generation Independent federal cross-check of generation at Washington power plants by fuel.

    Retrieved November 3, 2026. Public domain (U.S. government work). Values copied into eia-instate-generation.csv.

    Reliability: Government. Federal statistical agency; facets location WA, sector 99 (all), fuels HYC, WND, SUN, COW, NG, ALL.

11. Todd Myers, Political spin in state's new CO2 emissions reports masks climate policy failure, Washington Policy Center, April 27, 2026 The claims checked: the gap to the 2030 path, the needed yearly cut, the drivers of the 2022 drop, and the reporting deadline.

    Retrieved November 3, 2026. All rights reserved; quoted briefly for review. Linked and quoted, not rehosted.

    Reliability: Party to the dispute. Has a stake in this finding. Washington Policy Center is a free-market think tank that has criticized the state's climate policies and sued Ecology over the inventory's timing.

Limitations and reproducibility

Fully reproducible: All inputs are public. build.js recomputes every saved analysis from the CSV tables, which were copied from the cited workbook, report table, API query and open-data query.

• The inventory ends in 2022. 2023 and 2024 values here are estimates from large-emitter reports, which use different coverage and methods.
• The statute sets only limits for 2020, 2030, 2040 and 2050. Any path between them is an analytical choice; several are shown.
• Ecology sets the 1990 baseline at 93.1 MMT under current methods, while the statute also names fixed tonnages (90.5 MMT for 2020, 50 MMT for 2030). Both readings are shown.
• The electricity sector is consumption-based (power bought by Washington utilities, including imports); all other sectors are production-based estimates, mostly downscaled from national data by EPA's State Inventory Tool.
• Changes in power sources from one year to the next are descriptive; they do not split the emissions change among causes.