Energy insecurity is the condition of being unable to adequately meet your household’s energy needs, whether because of cost, housing conditions, or both. It affects tens of millions of U.S. households and goes well beyond simply having a high electricity bill. The concept captures a cycle where financial strain, inefficient housing, and difficult trade-offs around basic needs reinforce one another.
The Three Dimensions of Energy Insecurity
Researchers at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health define energy insecurity through three interconnected dimensions: economic, physical, and coping.
The economic dimension refers to spending a disproportionate share of household income on utility bills. Analysts use a metric called “energy burden,” the percentage of income that goes toward energy costs, to measure this. The national average sits around 3.5%. An energy burden of 6% or higher is considered high, and anything above 10% is classified as severe. For a household earning $30,000 a year, a severe burden means spending more than $3,000 annually just to keep the lights on and the temperature livable.
The physical dimension involves the home itself. Drafty windows, poor insulation, aging heating systems, and inefficient appliances all drive up energy costs while making the home less comfortable. Low-income households are frequently stuck in the least efficient housing stock, often because of long-term disinvestment and poor maintenance by landlords. A home that leaks heat in winter and absorbs it in summer forces residents to run their systems harder and pay more for worse results.
The coping dimension captures what people actually do when they can’t afford adequate energy. This includes setting thermostats to uncomfortable or unsafe temperatures, skipping meals, postponing medical care, or using a kitchen stove for heat. These aren’t minor inconveniences. They are survival strategies with real consequences.
Who Is Most Affected
Energy insecurity falls hardest on low-income households, racial and ethnic minorities, and families with children. African American households are particularly vulnerable. On average, Black households spend about 5.3% of their income on energy, compared to the national average of 3.5%, an energy burden nearly twice as high. This disparity holds across the economic spectrum, not just among the lowest earners.
The reasons are structural. African American households are more likely to live in older homes with poorly functioning energy infrastructure: outdated heating systems, inadequate insulation, and inefficient appliances. During heat waves in four U.S. cities, one study found that white households had air conditioning at twice the rate of Black households, and Black populations were more likely to die during extreme heat events. Among all households that reported forgoing food or medicine to pay energy bills, over 28% faced that decision every single month.
How Energy Insecurity Harms Health
Living in a home you can’t adequately heat or cool takes a measurable toll on the body. Dangerous indoor temperatures can cause hypothermia in winter and heat stress, dehydration, and even death in summer. Using a gas stove or oven for heat, a common coping strategy, releases combustion byproducts directly into living spaces and is linked to respiratory problems. Poor sleep from thermal discomfort compounds these effects over time.
The mental health consequences are equally serious. A large study published in JAMA Network Open found that energy-insecure adults had roughly 2.3 times the odds of reporting symptoms of both anxiety and depression compared to people without energy insecurity. That association held even after accounting for other social determinants of health like income and education. The chronic stress of choosing between paying the electric bill and buying groceries, of dreading a shutoff notice, of living in a home that’s too hot or too cold, creates a persistent psychological burden that compounds financial hardship.
The Growing Role of Extreme Heat
Energy insecurity was historically framed as a winter problem, centered on heating costs in cold climates. That framing is increasingly outdated. As temperatures rise, the inability to afford air conditioning has become a life-threatening form of energy insecurity, particularly in southern states where cooling seasons are long and intensifying.
Researchers describe this as the “heat stroke or go broke” predicament. Running an air conditioner during a prolonged heat wave can spike electricity bills by hundreds of dollars in a single month. Some households that receive donated air conditioning units still can’t afford to operate them. Meanwhile, the federal formula used to distribute energy assistance has historically favored cold-weather states, creating a mismatch: southern states with higher cooling needs and higher rates of energy insecurity receive less funding per capita.
In 2022, the federal government began urging states to redirect more energy assistance funds toward cooling, including keeping registration open through summer months and helping households obtain and actually run air conditioning. But operational costs remain a barrier even when the equipment is available.
What Coping Actually Looks Like
In 2020, roughly 24.6 million U.S. households prioritized paying energy bills over buying food or medicine. That number captures a specific, quantifiable form of deprivation, but the full range of coping behaviors is broader. Households delay doctor visits, skip prescriptions, keep homes at temperatures they know are unsafe, layer blankets instead of turning on heat, and avoid using appliances to keep bills down. Some of these strategies are invisible to outsiders. A family might never lose power but still live in conditions that damage their health over years.
These energy-limiting behaviors create a feedback loop. Skipping medical care worsens chronic conditions. Poor nutrition weakens immune function. Inadequate sleep from thermal discomfort reduces the ability to work and earn. The financial strain that caused the coping behavior in the first place deepens.
Housing Upgrades and Assistance Programs
Because so much of energy insecurity traces back to the physical condition of homes, efficiency upgrades can make a meaningful difference. Insulating attics, replacing drafty windows, swapping old refrigerators for efficient models, and installing better lighting all reduce the amount of energy a household needs to stay comfortable. A European study found that countries with high energy efficiency standards for homes, like Sweden, Norway, and Finland, had lower rates of excess winter deaths than countries with poorly insulated housing stock like Ireland, the UK, and Portugal.
For low-income renters, though, upgrading the home is rarely within their control. Landlords may have little financial incentive to invest in efficiency improvements, especially in housing markets where demand is high regardless of building quality. This is one reason energy insecurity is so persistent: the people who bear the cost of inefficiency are not the people who own the buildings.
The primary federal program addressing energy insecurity is the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, or LIHEAP, which received approximately $3.7 billion in funding for fiscal year 2026. LIHEAP provides bill payment assistance, crisis support during extreme weather, and some weatherization services. The program helps millions of households each year, but funding has never been sufficient to reach all eligible families, and the geographic distribution of funds still skews toward heating over cooling despite shifting climate realities.