Starting July 27, 2025, the Department of Commerce can create new ways for building owners, including hospitals, to apply for exemptions or deadline extensions under the Clean Buildings Law, based on SHB 1543.
Thanks to advocacy by WSHA and the Association of Washington Public Hospital Districts during the 2025 legislative session, public hospital districts with limited debt capacity now qualify for a specific exemption under the Clean Buildings Law. Other exemptions and extensions are available for any building type, including hospitals.
The law directs the Department of Commerce to conduct rulemaking to develop alternative energy and greenhouse gas emission targets, granting building owners more flexibility in meeting energy use intensity (EUI) targets (for Tier 1 buildings only), or energy management and benchmark requirements (Tier 2 buildings).
Hospitals are assigned different tiers based on their gross square footage.
For more details, read our recent bulletin. If you have any questions, please contact Remy Kerr. (Remy Kerr).