To Heat or Eat: Current Patterns of Energy Poverty and Redlining in the United States

Abstract

Redlining, a federal housing policy that began in 1934 and continued until 1968, continues to shape economic and environmental injustices across the United States. This housing policy restricted minority groups and people of color from accruing the most common form of social and monetary equity and wealth over much of the mid-20th century. It is possible that people in these groups currently face a higher energy burden, defined as the percentage of gross household income spent on energy costs (National Renewable Energy Laboratory, 2022). The objective of my research was to understand the relationship between the current spatial distribution of energy burden and the historical redlining process in the residential housing sector across different cities in the United States. The two major questions I addressed were: What is the pattern between current instances of energy burden and places where redlining was applied? And based on the statistical regions identified by the U.S. Census Bureau (e.g. Northeast, Midwest, etc.), what are the regional differences in these patterns when comparing energy burden vs temperature? Related to question 1, I hypothesized that the chance of being energy burdened was higher in formerly redlined communities compared to the three other respective classes that comprise the non-redlined communities. I further hypothesized that the northern regions of the United States have higher variances in the instances of energy burden when comparing formerly redlined communities to non-redlined communities within a region, due to the longer and colder winters in these areas compared to the southern regions. A new method for dataset development was used, followed by statistical analysis to identify the potential patterns between redlined areas and rates of energy burden. The results showed that census tracts located within formerly redlined communities have higher instances of energy burden, with the lowest energy burdens in communities that were graded A, and slight increases in energy burden for the remaining grades C, B and D. This trend was consistent for all U.S. statistical regions. Cities in the South showed the widest range of energy burden values for communities formerly graded at C and D. The research results could be used in policymaking to justify programs targeting formerly redlined areas to alleviate energy burden through weatherization and energy affordability programs from the state and federal level.