US Warming Cities Face Surging Cooling Demand and Unequal Energy Costs

As US cities record sustained summer heat that would have been statistically rare a generation ago, demand for air conditioning is rising sharply — and with it, electricity bills, grid stress, and carbon emissions from cooling. The burden is not evenly distributed: low-income households in older, poorly insulated housing stock pay a higher proportion of their income on energy and are more likely to forgo adequate cooling to manage costs, increasing their exposure to heat-related illness. Urban heat island effects concentrate the worst temperatures in the densest, most affordable — and often most racially segregated — urban neighbourhoods.

The policy bind is that electrifying cooling is simultaneously the right long-term climate choice and an immediate cost burden for the households who can least absorb it. Utility rate structures often charge higher marginal rates for peak-hour consumption — exactly when heat-stressed low-income households most need to run air conditioners. Targeted efficiency subsidies exist under the Inflation Reduction Act's weatherisation provisions, but uptake has been slow and the programme's future is uncertain given congressional budget pressures.

Watch whether cities with older housing stock — Detroit, Baltimore, Phoenix — accelerate building efficiency retrofits under local green bond financing as federal support becomes unreliable. That shift from federal to municipal climate finance would represent a structural change in who controls — and who pays for — the US's urban heat adaptation.