How a state accounting error inflated the impact of Washington’s $1.5 billion “CO₂ tax” spending — and why it matters
Washington state officials released what they billed as a sweeping look at how they spent $1.5 billion in revenue from the Climate Commitment Act (CCA)—the cap-and-invest program critics often call a “CO₂ tax.” The report, formally titled the Climate Commitment Act Investments report, was presented as proof that the program is delivering major emissions reductions while funding resilience, infrastructure, and projects aimed at “overburdened communities.”
But Todd Myers, Vice President for Research at the Washington Policy Center, says the state’s headline claim is driven by a massive data error—one so large it should have been caught immediately.
State CO2 report shows 86% of Washington’s claimed climate benefits are probably fake
"We don’t know where that number came from… that came from the state.’”
Todd Myers, VP of Research at the Washington Policy Center, says the claim is driven by a massive data error. pic.twitter.com/9QnzajV1Tg
— Ari Hoffman 🎗 (@thehoffather) January 7, 2026
Speaking on The Ari Hoffman Show on Talk Radio 570 KVI, Myers said that when he saw the report’s numbers, he knew something was off:
“The headline was, ‘Oh, we have reduced so much CO₂ emissions—almost 9 million metric tons… equivalent to 40% of the gas and diesel vehicles in Washington state for an entire year.’ And the cost to reduce that is only $40 a metric ton… that is an extremely low price. And the minute I saw that… I knew something was wrong.”
Myers’ critique is blunt: the report’s emissions reductions are not just optimistic; the bulk of them are incorrect.
The State’s Headline Claim: 9 Million Metric Tons Reduced
The Department of Ecology touted the report as evidence that CCA spending during the biennium would reduce emissions by nearly 9 million metric tons, a figure it compared to taking 40% of gas and diesel vehicles off Washington roads for a year, at an average cost of $40 per metric ton reduced.
Myers says that the cost figure is the first giveaway.
“Now, that doesn’t mean something to most people, but it means something to me… that is an extremely low price.”
Why? Because Myers says the state’s own history shows emissions reductions typically cost far more. In earlier climate spending programs, Washington projects averaged roughly $1,410 per metric ton, not $40.
A drop that dramatic could be revolutionary—if true. But Myers says it isn’t true.
Myers Requested the Spreadsheet — and Found the Problem
Rather than arguing from assumptions, Myers says he went straight to the underlying data.
“So what did I do? I sent an email to the Department of Ecology. I said, ‘Can you send me the spreadsheet with this?’ And they said, ‘Yes, here you go.’ So I sat down with the spreadsheet and went through it.”
The spreadsheet contained approximately 3,600 projects. What Myers found next is the core of the controversy:
“I found eight projects that are so badly skewed that they account for 86% of the total reductions… They’re fake. They’re totally wrong.”
Those eight projects came from a program subsidizing high-efficiency electric equipment and appliance upgrades such as heat pumps—projects that were reported to generate emissions reductions at a cost of $1 to $4 per metric ton, which Myers says is essentially impossible.
Eight Projects Produced 86% of the State’s Claimed Climate Success
This matters because the report’s entire story depends on those eight entries. If they are wrong—as Myers argues—the report’s headline conclusions collapse.
And Myers did not stop at pointing out bad math—he contacted grant recipients directly.
“So what I then did was that I emailed one of the recipients… and said, ‘Hey, I’m looking at this number. Did you generate this number?’ And they said, ‘No. We don’t know where that number came from… that came from the state.’”
That alone suggests Ecology’s report is not simply summarizing local data but assigning emissions reductions through state-level assumptions or formulas—assumptions that apparently went unchecked.
Commerce Acknowledged the Data Was Wrong
According to Myers, the follow-up was even more damaging.
“Two days later, they emailed me back and said… ‘I asked the Department of Commerce about this and here’s the email I got.’ And the Department of Commerce said, ‘Yes, that number is wrong. And Ecology knows it.’”
That aligns with the account in the written analysis: Commerce staff acknowledged a reporting error, and Myers says Ecology did not offer an explanation or correction even after the issue was flagged.
Myers framed it as an indictment of the agencies’ credibility:
“It just shows… the Department of Ecology who constantly tells us they are the experts… their report that they put out… is 86% fake.”
Correcting the Eight Errors Shrinks Emissions Reductions by 86%
Myers notes that 43 similar grants in the same program reported emissions reductions at a much more plausible cost of about $613 per metric ton, rather than $1 to $4 per ton.
If the eight outlier grants are corrected to match the more realistic figures, Myers estimates the report’s emissions reductions drop from nearly 9 million metric tons to about 1.2 million metric tons—only 14% of the state’s public claim.
That’s not a rounding error. It’s the difference between a transformational climate program and one whose impact has been dramatically overstated.
Other Accounting Tricks: The Ferry Electrification Claims
Myers also criticizes how the state assigns emissions reductions to projects like ferry dock electrification, noting the report credits some ferry-related investments with unusually low cost per ton of CO₂ reduced while excluding the costs of the hybrid ferries required to make the dock upgrades relevant. Without the new ferries, dock electrification produces zero emissions reductions, which makes the report’s accounting misleading.
On the radio show, Myers connected the broader accounting problems to what he sees as poor governance and outcomes:
“They claim we’re going to modernize our fleet of ferries so that way they’re more ecologically friendly. And yet now we have ferries that are breaking down… and are gonna be out of service forever.”
A Bigger Problem: Most of the Spending Isn’t Even Claimed to Reduce CO₂
Even after correcting errors, Myers emphasizes that much of the program’s spending isn’t designed to reduce emissions at all. The report shows that only a portion of funding is tied to “quantifiable emissions reductions,” while about 70% of spending is allocated to other categories where the state does not claim direct CO₂ reductions.
Myers argued this is why the public’s perception of the program is so far from reality:
“It is incredible how much money we are wasting on climate projects and climate policy that does absolutely nothing… and you wouldn’t ever know it unless somebody looked at it.”
He also suggested the program has become a slush fund:
“It just seems like they’re using this money for whatever they wanna use this money for… but it’s not actually doing what they said it would be doing.”
The Bottom Line: Climate Policy Requires Accurate Math
Whatever one thinks of the Climate Commitment Act, the stakes are enormous: billions of dollars, rising costs across the economy, and major claims about emissions reductions. That makes accuracy non-negotiable.
Myers says the biggest scandal isn’t simply that Ecology published a report with errors—it’s that the errors dramatically inflate the appearance of success, and were repeated as fact.
And if the numbers driving public messaging are wrong, Myers argues that Washington’s climate debate is being shaped by misleading data rather than measurable outcomes.
At minimum, he says, Washington owes taxpayers a corrected report and a transparent explanation of how such a massive error could survive internal review—especially when the agencies involved insist they are the experts.
