Oil Spending By Legislative District

Earlier this year, we reported that the Northwest set an ugly record in 2008. The region’s economy coughed up $30 billion to import fossil fuels. Of that sum, fully $13.8 billion was just for petroleum products in Washington State.

$13.8 billion is an astronomical figure. To bring it down to earth, I estimated the spending for each of Washington’s legislative districts in 2008.

Spending on oil in Washington, by legislative district, 2008

District	Millions of dollars
1	300
2	337
3	252
4	297
5	324
6	277
7	268
8	292
9	274
10	285
11	266
12	275
13	289
14	262
15	272
16	309
17	308
18	331
19	262
20	294
21	272
22	&n bsp; &nbsp ; 279
23	270
24	270
25	299
26	279
27	266
28	273
29	264
30	266
31	293
32	258
33	259
34	261
35	279
36	269
37	268
38	271
39	301
40	289
41	286
42	289
43	272
44	307
45	287
46	257
47	&n bsp; 287
48	262
49	288

Methodology: Spending figures for legislative districts are estimates based on the total oil spending in Washington in 2008 and the share of the state’s population in each district as of April 1, 2008. Estimates assume that each district had equal per capita spending. Legislative district population figures are from the Washington Office of Financial Management, here. Energy spending for Washington is calculated by Sightline Institute based on data from the US Federal Highway Administration and the US Energy Information Administration. (Detailed state-level spending methodology can be found on the Cascadia Scorecard’s “Energy” webpage, here; click on “sources.”) Total spending on fossil fuels in Washington was $16.6 billion in 2008, of which $13.8 billion was for oil.