As the Heat Arrives: 7 Things to Know About Energy Affordability and Extreme Heat
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When my parents immigrated to the United States from India, they carried with them a quiet calculus of survival. They’ve told my sister and me stories about sleeping on the floor of a two-bedroom apartment, six adults sharing space, rotating schedules, and working odd jobs—anything that could stretch what little they had a bit further.
They were always trying to figure out how to save money. Not as a preference or a lifestyle, but as a necessity. Because at that time, saving even a small amount could mean the difference between stability and struggle.
That same kind of decision-making shapes daily life for many households. But today it’s unfolding under a different set of conditions—where rising costs, financial pressures, and extreme weather increasingly intersect.
As summers grow hotter and energy costs continue to rise, the question of what people can afford (often referred to as energy affordability) is becoming increasingly connected to how they experience heat—and, in some cases, whether they can stay safe through it.
These aren’t just questions about comfort. They’re questions about navigating extreme weather, which can have serious implications not just for comfort but for cost, health, and well-being.
And now Danger Season is upon us. Danger Season—the period between May and October when North America is hit hardest by extreme weather, like heat, drought, wildfire, and hurricanes—brings severe implications for households across the country. There are a few things worth keeping in mind about the connections between extreme heat, energy affordability, and the ability to stay cool safely.
During the summer months, air conditioning can account for a significant share of household electricity use, especially during periods of extreme heat. For many households, staying cool means using more electricity at the exact moment energy demand and costs are rising.
And while most households in the United States have some form of air conditioning, access doesn’t always mean affordability. The ability to cool a home safely and consistently is shaped by cost. For many, the decisions start to look familiar: Do I turn on the air conditioning, or try to get by with a fan? Do I keep it running through the night, or turn it off to save money?
For many households, the challenge doesn’t begin with extreme temperatures. It begins with the bill.
Electricity costs are already rising across much of the country—and for many households, they’ve been rising quickly. These rising costs aren’t random, they’re shaped by growing electricity demand, aging infrastructure, fossil fuel price spikes, and the increasing strain of extreme weather on the grid. For households already managing tight budgets, that changes how people experience the summer months. In some parts of the country, high summer cooling costs also arrive directly after months of expensive winter heating bills, leaving many households entering the summer without much financial recovery
For a growing share of households, cooling isn’t something they turn on without thinking, it’s something they must seriously weigh against other essentials. People start making decisions early: running the AC less, delaying turning it on, closing off some spaces to avoid having to cool them, bracing for what the bill might bring. By the time the first heatwave arrives, many households are already carrying the stress of what it will cost to stay safe.
We often talk about air conditioning like it’s optional. But during periods of extreme heat, it becomes a safeguard. Extreme heat is one of the deadliest weather-related risks in the United States. Access to reliable, affordable cooling is one of the most effective ways to reduce that risk.
But that protection only works if people feel able to use it. When cost becomes a barrier, safety does too.
Housing conditions can also intensify these risks. Older or poorly insulated homes often trap heat more easily and require more energy to cool, increasing both indoor temperatures and electricity use during heatwaves. In practice, that means some households are entering extreme heat events with far fewer protections than others.
For households where energy bills already take up a significant share of income, staying cool isn’t just expensive—it can become destabilizing. The financial strain of cooling during extreme heat often compounds existing vulnerabilities, especially for households already navigating housing insecurity, chronic illness, disability, aging infrastructure, or other economic pressures.
These aren’t one-time decisions. They happen day after day during a heatwave: running the AC less, delaying its use, or trying to cool only part of a home. Over time, those tradeoffs can lead to hotter indoor temperatures, disrupted sleep, worsened health conditions, and increased exposure to dangerous heat.
And because energy burden is not experienced equally across households, the same heatwave can carry very different consequences depending on income, housing conditions, health status, and access to resource.
For some households, those tradeoffs eventually lead to something more severe: utility disconnection. When electricity is shut off, cooling doesn’t just become unaffordable—it becomes inaccessible. And the impacts extend quickly beyond heat:
- Homes become unsafe during extreme temperatures
- Food and medications spoil
- Medical devices stop working
- Families may be forced to leave their homes
Disconnection is not just a financial event: it’s a sign that the system meant to provide essential service is failing to protect the people who rely on it. During extreme heat, it can turn dangerous conditions into life-threatening ones.
Policies meant to protect households from shutoffs during extreme weather vary significantly by state, utility, and season. In many parts of the country, protections during extreme heat are weaker than those against winter shutoffs, even as summers become increasingly dangerous. And while programs like Low Income Energy Assistance Program can provide critical support, cooling assistance and summer coverage remain limited or inconsistent for many households. Recent federal data from the US Energy Information Administration found that residential electricity service was disconnected 13.4 million times in 2024 because of unpaid bills, highlighting the scale of energy insecurity many households continue to face.
The weight of these conditions isn’t evenly distributed. Some households are entering summer with higher energy burdens. Some are living in homes that trap heat more easily. Some are navigating health conditions that make heat more dangerous. And some are doing all of this at once.
The result is that the same heatwave can carry very different consequences depending on where you live, how your home is built, and what resources you have access to.
It doesn’t have to be this way.
The systems shaping these experiences—electricity costs, housing quality, grid investments, shutoff policies, and energy assistance programs—were built over time. And they can be reshaped.
We can design programs that reduce energy burden. We can invest in cooling access and resilience. We can prevent disconnections during extreme weather and strengthen protections for households most at risk. We can plan for extreme heat as something we know is coming—not something we react to after the fact. And we can work to reduce the climate pollution driving more dangerous heat extremes overtime.
Because the reality is people shouldn’t have to navigate life-or-struggle decisions just to stay cool in their own homes.
My parents’ stories are part of a longer thread—one that continues today in different forms, in different places, across the country (and around the world). The details may look different. But the underlying question remains the same: What does it take to get through the day—and what does it cost?
As summer approaches, that question becomes harder for too many households to answer. And that’s something we still have the power and responsibility to change. Behind every rising bill is a set of decisions about how our energy system is built and run—and who it’s built to serve.
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