Household Energy Costs Under Climate Change

Abstract

High energy burdens challenge nearly a quarter of US households and could increase under climate change due to shifts in space heating and cooling. Using detailed building models, building physics-based simulations, and downscaled meteorological data, we quantify seasonal and annual household energy costs for roughly 3,000 households across seven U.S. cities under historic and future climates. Climate change will reduce annual energy costs for median households in heating-dominated cities by 3-9%. But climate change will increase summer energy costs for most households and cities, with the 10th and 50th percentile of households in each city seeing energy bill increases of more than 20% and 5%, respectively. Buildings with characteristics commonly associated with low-income households are particularly vulnerable to rising summer energy costs under climate change. Absent increasing household wages or support, our results suggest climate change will exacerbate summer energy burdens while alleviating winter energy burdens in most U.S. cities.

Keywords: energy burdens, ResStock, climate change, climate impacts, climate adaptation, household energy costs