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Sociodemographic disparities in energy insecurity among low-income households before and during the COVID-19 pandemic

Nature Energy volume 6, pages 186–193 (2021)Cite this article

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Abstract

Energy insecurity is a growing public health threat among low-income populations in the United States. Prior research has shown that energy insecurity is associated with adverse health effects and can lead people to engage in risky coping strategies. Here we evaluate rates of energy insecurity, which factors contribute to it, and how the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated the problem. We show that energy insecurity is highly prevalent among households at or below 200% of the federal poverty line. We further show that Black and Hispanic households are more likely to experience energy insecurity and face utility disconnection, as are households with young children, individuals that require electronic medical devices and those in dwellings with inefficient or poor conditions. These conditions exist under normal circumstances, and the COVID-19 pandemic seems to have exacerbated the overall incidence of energy insecurity.

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Fig. 1: Proportion of survey respondents facing energy insecurity.
Fig. 2: Energy insecurity by demographic characteristics.
Fig. 3: Sociodemographic correlates of energy insecurity.
Fig. 4: COVID-19-related conditions and energy insecurity.
Fig. 5: COVID-19-related correlates of energy insecurity.

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Data availability

Data and associated materials used in this study are available in the Harvard Dataverse repository53, which includes the original survey data and codebook, the STATA data-processing do-file and the STATA data analysis do-file. Replication sources can be found at https://dataverse.harvard.edu/dataset.xhtml?persistentId=doi:10.7910/DVN/OMJWNB.

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Acknowledgements

We thank D. Hernández for sharing her survey instrument on energy insecurity, which informed our own survey design. This research was supported through funding provided by the National Science Foundation, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the Environmental Resilience Institute, funded by Indiana University’s Prepared for Environmental Change Grand Challenge initiative, and the Indiana University’s Office of the Vice President of Research.

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  1. Paul H. O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, USA

    Trevor Memmott, Sanya Carley, Michelle Graff & David M. Konisky

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  1. Trevor Memmott
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  2. Sanya Carley
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  4. David M. Konisky
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All the authors contributed to the conceptualization, research design, analysis and writing of this article.

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Correspondence to Sanya Carley.

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Peer review information Nature Energy thanks Stefan Bouzarovski, Lee White and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

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Memmott, T., Carley, S., Graff, M. et al. Sociodemographic disparities in energy insecurity among low-income households before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. Nat Energy 6, 186–193 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41560-020-00763-9

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