Virginia would suspend emissions auction participation and credit eligible utilities' customers

Virginia's environmental agency director would take all steps needed to suspend the state's participation in the auctions. The directive covers auctions under the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, a regional emissions trading program.

The state would send all collected regional trading revenue to eligible utilities for customer bill credits. Utilities qualify if they have approved or pending requests to recover pollution permit costs, or otherwise raised customer bills to recover those costs. State utility regulators would approve how utilities apply the credits. Credits would appear on a separate RGGI Credit line on covered Virginia customers' bills. Utilities would apply the credits after receiving the money from the state.