Your Daily Guide

Seattle Has Lots of EVs, but Needs More Renewables

If you are like me (a human being who has a car), you woke with a shudder to yesterday’s news that Seattle gas prices hit an all-time high (kudos to me for filling up just the night before!) at $5.72, the highest since 2022. All this has got me thinking about EVs and how we’re doing with green energy.

• 🚙 Seattle likes its EVs: Seattle ranks number 7 in U.S. Markets for owned or leased electric vehicles. The number of homes that owned or leased an EV went from 64,0000 to 165,000 from 2022 to 2025. 57% of those in 2025 were Teslas, which experienced significant backlash during Elon Musk’s time with the Trump administration. Unclear yet if that caused long-term damage to the Tesla legacy. [Seattle Times]
• 🏭 Are emissions declining? Emissions shrank by half a percentage point between 2021 and 2022, according to an emissions report released by the Department of Ecology late last week. They credit the decline to a higher reliance on renewable energy and hydropower specifically. However, we have a long way to go, and won’t reach our 2030 goal unless emissions are reduced by 5-7% every year, an equivalent to what happened during the COVID pandemic. Additionally, Cascadia Journal’s Andrew Engelson says that the reality is that emissions really fell by one-half of one percent, and gives a myriad of reasons related to freeway spending, free parking at light rail stations, the cruise industry, and our lack of reliance on green energy.
• 🪫 Last in renewable energy growth: A report by Oregon Public Broadcasting and ProPublica in 2025 showed how Washington had come to rank last in the country for renewable energy, and now the Department of Commerce is working with Bonneville Power, which owns 75% of Washington’s grid, to help move forward the renewable energy projects that are backlogged. However, Bonneville has to approve the wind and solar developers they work with, which could add more delay.

🅿️ Will you pay to park at light rail? Starting today, Light Rail stations in Northgate and Shoreline are charging $6 a day (or $60 a month) for folks to park between 4 and 10 a.m. on weekdays. According to Sound Transit, the goal is to encourage folks to take buses to the light rail station to decrease demand on stations that have garages with occupancy of 90% or more. This is proving to be controversial, with some riders saying they’d drive and that it will decrease ridership. [Seattle Times]

🎳 Journalists threaten to strike: Union members who work for McClatchy Media have voted to potentially strike over low wages. The company is refusing to raise wages above $52,000 for employees despite a well-documented affordability crisis. One reporter says that the price of the Idaho Statesman has increased by 55 percent to fund purchases of AI Company Trend Hunter and celebrity tabloid publisher accelerate360. [The Stranger]

🤖 Microsoft, Amazon increase AI spend: Speaking of AI, spending on it is only increasing, as Microsoft and Amazon will spend about $390 billion on artificial intelligence. Microsoft and Amazon are both focused on purchasing the computer chips required to use AI. Additionally, Amazon is investing more in data centers and Amazon Web Services, whose revenue has grown the most among all of Amazon’s business investments. [Seattle Times]