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Push for year-long daylight saving time moves forward

By Julia Ingram March 12, 2022 (Updated March 15, 2022)

The annual switch to daylight saving time happened on Sunday this year. For years, states have fought to end clock-switching, either by switching to year-round standard time or permanent daylight time, with little success. In 2022, here's where state bills stand.

17 states have adopted or enacted legislation on Daylight Saving Time over the past two years
All successful bills call for year-round daylight time pending Congressional approval.

Enacted

Failed

2020

2021

Alabama

Georgia

Ohio

Maine

Minnesota

Mississippi

Montana

Idaho

Louisiana

South Carolina

Utah

Washington

Wyoming

28 states are considering legislation on Daylight Saving Time in 2022
Most states introduced legislation to move to year-round DST. Six states are considering bills to only use standard time, and five have competing bills for which way to turn the clock.

Pending

Enacted

Failed

2021

2020

2022

Alaska

California

Iowa

Kansas

Kentucky

Maryland

Massachusetts

Michigan

Minnesota

Daylight

time

Nebraska

New Hampshire

New Jersey

North Carolina

Ohio

South Carolina

South Dakota

Utah

Colorado

Missouri

Vermont

Standard

time

Virginia

Washington

West Virginia

Georgia

Illinois

Bills

for both

New York

Oklahoma

Pennsylvania


And on Tuesday, the Senate made a stride toward pushing the country toward a nationwide switch to permanent daylight saving time by passing the Sunshine Protection Act, which if approved by the House of Representative and President Joe Biden, would put the country in daylight time year-round, effective 2023. If that were the case, here's what the first day of 2023 might look like, based on sunrise and sunset times on Jan. 1, 2022.

If the U.S. observed nationwide daylight saving time, on Jan. 1, 2022, most cities would have seen sunrise after 8 a.m. and sunsets after 6 p.m.

Sunrise

earlier

later

Sunrise could have been as late as

9:42 a.m. in Williston, North Dakota

but as early as 7:37 in

Panama City, Florida

Sunset

later

earlier

The earliest sunset would

have been at 5:01 p.m., in

Bonners Ferry, Idaho

and the latest as 6:58 p.m.

in Odessa, Texas

This story was done for Data Studio, a class in the Columbia Journalism School. To view the source code and read more about the project, visit the GitHub repository here.