In short, Big Tech won, said state Sen. Sharon Shewmake, D-Bellingham, as she broke the news that House Bill 2515 died in committee this week.
The sweeping measure, which she and a small band of fellow Democrats backed, had aimed to protect consumers and Washington's environment against the resource-hungry data centers. Among other things, the bill would have required the facilities to pay higher electric rates and more transparently report on their water and power use.
But tech lobbyists for companies like Microsoft and Amazon, alongside their allies, rallied against the proposal. They successfully watered down the measure, and ultimately, saw to its demise in the Senate Ways and Means Committee on Monday.
Lawmakers within the committee took no action on the measure, meaning they didn’t pass it on to the Senate floor for a vote. The Senate as a whole didn’t have the votes to approve the proposal, Shewmake said, so the committee allowed it to perish.
A vote of the full chamber was always going to be tight, Shewmake said. This was a controversial and heavily scrutinized piece of legislation and early on it attracted much attention and effort from the wealthy industry.
“We just got outgunned,” Shewmake said.
As originally written, the bill would have required public and private utilities to propose a new set of tariffs for data centers, effectively higher electricity rates. The idea was to ensure the facilities paid for any new grid infrastructure they needed to meet their growing energy demand rather than pushing any bill increases onto regular ratepayers.
The measure would have included a flat fee for every kilowatt hour of energy the data centers used, which would have gone toward things like low-income bill assistance and weatherization projects. The bill also included transparency requirements, mandating reports on water and chemical use. It would have ensured data centers take power cuts during energy shortages before more critical customers, like hospitals.
Some of the bill's language echoed recommendations from a working group Gov. Bob Ferguson convened last year to examine the industry's ripple effect on Washington's economy, tax revenue, energy use and environment. That working group followed a 2024 Seattle Times and ProPublica investigation on clean energy and economic impacts from the state's data centers.
Lobbyists, especially for companies like Microsoft and Amazon — and even a broader data center industry group — pushed hard against individual regulations in the proposal while also moving to strike the entire text, offering some insight into just how hard-fought any new regulations focused on the industry will be.
They called the measure overly prescriptive and argued it threatened to box the lucrative industry out of Washington entirely.
Reflecting on the loss, Shewmake said sometimes these types of sweeping bills take several years to pass. The Climate Commitment Act took something like a decade to make it into law, she said.
Lawmakers will take another stab at the regulations during next year’s long legislative session. But Shewmake won’t be there to see or support the measure in any official capacity because she’s not running for reelection.
State Rep. Beth Doglio, D-Olympia, will be, though. She said in a texted statement that she remains committed to ensuring the costs of our increasingly digital economy aren’t shifted onto working families and small businesses.
“This bill is about fairness, grid reliability, transparency, and protecting our clean energy commitments,” said Doglio, who sponsored the bill. “It’s easy for big tech to make big promises in press releases. But when states ask for accountability to those promises, their commitment evaporates.”
Already, states across the country are feeling higher electricity rates and dwindling water and power supplies from the data centers sprouting up. In Washington, the facilities are expected to be the single largest growth factor for an energy demand ticking sharply upward. Experts warn of blackout risks and supply gaps in the coming years.
The longer Washington waits to impose additional regulations on the industry, the greater the consequences will be, said Zach Baker, regional state and policy director for the nonprofit NW Energy Coalition, a clean-power advocacy group.
While lawmakers craft their next proposal — and then debate the issue — data centers will continue popping up, Baker said. And once they’re built, it will be more difficult to impose new regulations on them.
Throughout the legislative process, data center operators and advocates have argued that the industry already contends with many existing regulations and additional scrutiny from lawmakers amounts to singling out the industry.
In the meantime, eyes are likely turning to another, related bill: Senate Bill 6231, which would end certain tax exemptions for data centers in an attempt to claw back tens of millions in revenue officials in Washington forewent to actively draw the industry here. That bill has already passed through the Senate and will be heard before the House Committee on Finance Wednesday morning.
© 2026 The Seattle Times. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
