Partisan clashes in Pennsylvania and budget headaches in Maryland cloud prospects for climate and environmental legislation in those states this year.
But things are different in Virginia, where the election of a Democratic governor has raised expectations that measures stalled by her Republican predecessor will move forward. Here’s an overview at the state of play this year for environmental and energy legislation in the three main Chesapeake Bay states.
Maryland
It’s déjà vu in Annapolis. For the second year in a row, the Maryland General Assembly will be wrestling with money woes and the state’s energy future when its 90-day legislative session opens Jan. 14.
Lawmakers will be presented with the usual flurry of environmental legislation, including some they have failed to pass before.
But overall, environmental groups are reining in their legislative ambitions because of the state’s fiscal straits.
“Our primary focus is going to be the budget,” said Allison Colden, Maryland executive director of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation. “Without funding … there’s not much aggressive policy that we can move forward.”
In 2025, lawmakers closed a massive $3.3 billion budget gap by slashing $2 billion in spending and raising the remainder with new and increased taxes and fees. In the process, funding for land preservation, clean energy, climate action and water pollution prevention took hits. Environmentalists felt relieved that they managed to fend off even deeper cuts.
This time, the budget gap isn’t quite as big — at $1.4 billion. But with elections looming in November, Democratic Gov. Wes Moore and legislative leaders alike have sworn off any more revenue measures. Painful spending cuts appear likely.
The state’s environmental agencies account for a tiny fraction of the overall budget, so cuts to them can’t yield big savings. Worried activists hope to ward off any more raids on dedicated environmental funds.
Last year, lawmakers took $300 million from the Strategic Energy Investment Fund, which collects payments from fossil-fuel energy companies to spend on solar power, energy efficiency and low-income bill relief. They also diverted $25 million per year for four years from Program Open Space, which funds acquisition and development of parks, natural areas and recreation facilities.
The energy investment fund is a particularly fat target, projected to generate about $700 million in new pollution payments in the coming year.
“This is a critical time for us to be increasing our investments in energy efficiency and electrification,” said Josh Tulkin, executive director of the Maryland Sierra Club. State spending on clean energy is more needed than ever, he said, in light of the Trump administration’s wholesale cancellation of federal funding.
Last year, amid uproar over rising electricity bills, legislative leaders pushed through measures aimed at fast-tracking development of new power projects, including solar and battery storage. But the legislation also invited proposals for natural gas-fired power plants — something climate activists warned would undermine Maryland’s ability to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Caught off guard in 2025, activists hope this year to head off the gas rush. They are backing legislation to boost solar development at a time when federal support for renewable energy has been withdrawn. One bill would reform the way funds collected from utility companies get spent to incentivize more solar projects. Another would expedite and lower the cost of rooftop solar installments.
“This year, the most important topics are around energy affordability,” said Kim Coble, executive director of the Maryland League of Conservation Voters. “That’s why we really believe renewables need to be promoted because they are the fastest deployed, the cleanest and least expensive [ways to get more in-state power generation].
“That should be the conversation,” she concluded, “not where do we build a gas plant.”
Beyond the budget and energy, activists hope to win passage of a few environmental bills that have fallen short in previous years. Among the candidates:
- Dubbed the CHERISH Act, this measure would require state regulators to consider existing pollution in a community before issuing new pollution permits or renewing old ones.
- Transportation and climate: This bill would require state transportation planners to account for the climate impacts of building new highways.
- A “bottle bill,” which aims to boost recycling by requiring consumers to pay a redeemable deposit on plastic bottles, cans and glass containers.
Maryland’s waterkeeper groups also hope to see renewed legislation aimed at limiting toxic PFAS, or “forever chemicals,” in farm and garden fertilizer and in a range of consumer products. They also hope lawmakers will approve a bill requiring inspections of residential septic systems.
Activists celebrated a couple of early wins from December’s special legislative session. Lawmakers overrode gubernatorial vetoes of 2025 bills calling for studies of the environmental impacts of data centers and the costs to Maryland of greenhouse gas emissions.
Before the data center study gets underway, though, bills are expected to be introduced during the 90-day session to regulate the centers’ massive and growing energy demands, which are driving up power bills.
Pennsylvania
It’s hard to pass bills in Pennsylvania’s sharply divided General Assembly, and environmental measures are no exception. That proved to be the case in 2025, and 2026 is shaping up to be more of the same.
Pennsylvania, in fact, was the last state to adopt its budget last year. The Republican-controlled Senate and Democratic-controlled House didn’t broker a deal until Nov. 12, ending a nearly five-month standoff.
The $50 billion spending plan was made possible largely by Republicans conceding on school funding measures and Democrats relinquishing one of their hardest-fought environmental battles in recent memory: the state’s participation in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI).
RGGI is a coalition of 10 Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic states that seeks to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from power plants by requiring the facility owners to pay fees if they exceed annual limits. In 2019, then-Gov. Tom Wolf, a Democrat, ordered the state to join the compact, but the move was challenged in court, leaving Pennsylvania’s status in limbo.
Environmentalists blasted the withdrawal from RGGI. “I think it sent a bad message particularly when Pennsylvania is the fourth-largest global warming polluting state in the nation,” said PennEnvironment executive director David Masur. “If any state should be participating in a program like RGGI, Pennsylvania should be the one.”
But the budget did contain some positives for environmentalists, including a 5.5% increase for the Department of Environmental Protection. It also set aside $50 million for the Clean Streams Law, appropriating $35 million of that total to help farmers install more pollution-reduction projects.
The 2025 session contained few other highlights for environmental backers, Masur said. For a second year in a row, a push to open the door to community solar projects, which would enable residents to pool their resources to build private solar arrays, passed the House but faltered in the Senate.
The same fate — approved in the House, stalled in the Senate — befell a bill that would have required the amount of renewable electricity in the state’s energy portfolio to be increased from 4% to 35% by 2035.
One of the few environmental efforts that crossed the finish line was an initiative that helps schools install solar panels. The Solar for Schools program has proved popular, with the state receiving $88 million in funding requests last year during its pilot phase, far exceeding the $25 million available dollars. The General Assembly re-upped the program in November’s budget for the same amount of money.
Pennsylvania’s legislature reconvened Jan. 6. The General Assembly operates on a two-year schedule, so bills from last year are eligible to be revived this year.
But environmental advocates are girding for more gridlock. Pennsylvania is one of just three states with a divided General Assembly, all but assuring a dismissal of any controversial propositions.
And with Gov. Josh Shapiro near the top of the 2028 Democratic presidential candidate discussion, state Republicans are seen as unlikely to hand him any significant political wins, such as approving his proposal to replace RGGI with a state-specific cap-and-trade program.
Among the environmental and energy holdovers from last year are Shapiro’s pitch to create a state board to clear red tape for energy projects, a bill to tighten permitting requirements for projects in designated environmental justice communities, and a bipartisan measure prohibiting the sale and use of firefighting foam that contains forever chemicals.
Many environmental bills are likely to remain stalled, including measures to ban polystyrene takeout food containers and cups, expand the electric vehicle rebate program and help school districts acquire electric buses.
Virginia
Virginia Democrats have taken control of both chambers and now the executive branch with new governor Abigail Spanberger. Many advocates are cautiously optimistic that environmental bills vetoed last year will pass in 2026. The General Assembly session begins Jan. 14.
Energy production remains a focus for advocates and policymakers. The Virginia Clean Economy Act requires Dominion Energy to source 100% of its energy from renewables by 2045 and install 16.1 gigawatts of solar and onshore wind energy by 2035.
One bill would amend the act to increase the amount of utility-scale solar projects that utilities have to build from 1% to 5%, and it would expand the amount of solar capacity that can be built on previously disturbed land from 200 megawatts to 1,000 megawatts, or 1 gigawatt.
Some proposed bills attempt to expand solar energy. One calls for a new legal class of portable solar installations, such as photovoltaic panels made for balconies, for renters. Another measure, molded by recommendations from the Commission on Electric Utility, would set statewide standards for utility-scale solar projects that counties would incorporate into their ordinances, but it would not mandate that localities approve any projects.
Spanberger’s Affordable Virginia Agenda also has bills that require utilities to make energy efficiency improvements to at least 30% of qualifying households of low-income residents. Another bill will create a weatherization task force to identify solutions to barriers low-income customers face when trying to enroll in current energy efficiency programs.
Spanberger also plans on returning Virginia to the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, which makes power plants pay a fee if they exceed their emission limits. The state’s RGGI membership is in limbo, pending court decisions.
Many bills from 2025 aimed at regulating data centers are back — for example, tying clean energy requirements to the tax breaks that data center companies receive for their servers. Those servers require lots of water to stay cool, so other bills would require companies to report water use to the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality and prohibit the use of nondisclosure agreements to conceal that usage.
Several other bills are also in play.
- Environmental justice: A bill supported by Virginia Interfaith Power and Light would require state agencies to evaluate cumulative pollution impacts on vulnerable communities before approving new permits.
- Habitat and wildlife: The Chesapeake Bay Foundation supports measures that would fund an oyster stock assessment, allow the state to reuse dredged materials to build habitat, and establish and fund a three-year study of the Bay’s menhaden population, with a pause on the fishery while scientists conduct the research.
- PFAS: The Potomac Riverkeeper Network is pushing legislation that would require setting interim safety standards for toxic PFAS in biosolids, test biosolids (sewage sludge) for the chemicals and establish a protocol for disposing of contaminated biosolids. Many farmers use biosolids to fertilize their fields, and biosolids containing PFAS are making their way from Maryland to Virginia farm fields and raising health concerns.