What is Energy Insecurity?

What is Energy Insecurity?

People who struggle to pay their monthly electric and gas bills live in a state of energy insecurity, defined by sociologist Diana Hernandez as “an inability to adequately meet household basic energy needs,” including heating, cooling, and lighting. 10 Energy insecurity takes a wide view of the many factors that can result in difficulty maintaining energy services, while also calling attention to how vulnerable households are impacted by the compounding effects of unaffordable and inaccessible energy.

Energy insecurity has multiple dimensions. Economic energy insecurity encompasses all financial challenges households face to maintain steady energy services, especially the disproportionate costs carried by low-income households. Physical energy insecurity considers how the home structure impacts energy access and affordability. Low-income households have limited means to upgrade their home’s structure or technology to increase energy savings. Inefficient homes can place them at a higher risk for health problems and high energy costs. Behavioral energy insecurity highlights the ways in which households adapt to energy costs through behavior modification. While certain behaviors can help households cope with high costs and prevent utility shutoffs, strategies to heat or cool the home with nontraditional means can put residents at risk of health and safety problems.

SEEA believes energy insecurity is a key metric for understanding the inequitable distribution of energy benefits and burdens on residents of the Southeast. Energy insecurity calls attention to the many factors that influence energy access and affordability. These include the age and quality of housing stock, presence of advanced building technologies, siting of energy infrastructure, and the non-energy implications of energy unaffordability. Understanding the multiple dimensions of energy insecurity can also shed light on groups who are in danger of becoming burdened by energy costs or face disruptions in their access to energy services. Energy insecurity extends beyond issues of affordability, encompassing energy access as well as the burdens that the generation, transmission, and consumption of energy places on residents of the Southeast.

Energy insecurity also reflects the ways that resident behavior impacts energy use. Residents do not passively accept energy insecurities. They modify behavior to cope with unaffordable energy, sometimes reducing the chance of shutoffs and arrearages, but in other cases exposing themselves to health and safety risks. Understanding these congruent issues allows for more effective engagement with the causes and effects of unaffordable energy. Energy insecurity is a useful frame for grappling with the full range of household impacts that high energy costs can have is a necessary component of any policy or program designed to address energy inequities.

Measuring Energy Insecurity

Energy insecurity encompasses a wide range of conditions is most accurately measured through a combination of metrics and approaches.

Physical Energy Insecurity

One approach is to focus on how energy infrastructure in the home disproportionately puts low-income households at high risk for health, safety, and affordability problems. By considering how the performance and safety of HVAC systems, appliances, and hot water heating infrastructure compares with these elements in other homes, it is possible to measure how energy services in the home are stratified by income, geography, housing type, and quality.

Behavioral Energy Insecurity

Another approach is to obtain qualitative data from residents to demonstrate the impact of energy insecurity and countering behaviors. Economic and physical measures cannot account for issues like the thermal comfort and health of the home as experienced by the resident. Stefan Bouzarovski argues that it is “important to consider the individual, household and community-level determinants of energy dynamics in the residential environment, by taking into account environmental, cultural, technical and architectural factors.” A qualitative approach helps determine whether coping mechanisms like using an oven or space heater to stay warm places increases residents’ health and safety risks.

Economic Energy Insecurity

Economic measures of energy insecurity are often conflated with energy insecurity writ large. There are several general approaches to measuring economic energy insecurity. The simplest approach considers any household that cannot pay its bill as cost burdened. Another approach is to measure the annual expenses required by a household to pay all energy costs. The most common way to measure the economic dimensions of energy insecurity, and the way this report explores in detail, is to normalize energy costs by dividing all annual costs by household income to calculate the energy cost burden (as a % of annual income).