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The Conversation U.S.
Power outages linked to heat and storms are rising, and low-income communities are most at risk – NYC maps show the impact
By Nina Flores, Columbia University and Joan A. Casey, University of Washington,
15 days ago
Many Americans think of power outages as infrequent inconveniences, but that’s quickly changing. Nationwide, major power outages have increased tenfold since 1980 , largely because of an aging electrical grid and damage sustained from severe storms as the planet warms.
For older adults and others with health conditions, a loss of power may be more than an inconvenience. It can be life-threatening .
We study environmental health , including the effects of extreme heat and storms on people. In a new study , we analyzed data from New York City and the surrounding area to understand how severe weather drives power outages and who is most at risk, particularly in urban areas.
Low-income communities often at highest risk
How quickly power returns in a community is often shaped by history.
Though these guidelines appear neutral, they can inadvertently prolong outages for less populated areas and areas lacking resources, including these key assets. For example, following Tropical Storm Ida in September 2021, Con Edison outlined areas with important community assets as priorities for restoring power . Manhattan had power back within hours, while many low-income and largely nonwhite parts of Queens, the Bronx and Brooklyn waited for days.
Emerging evidence from studies on power outages in Texas , Florida , the Southeast and a national study , along with our new research in New York, shows that outages especially burden communities that don’t have adequate funding.
Complex weather and battery-life thresholds
Across New York state, we found that 40% of all outages from 2017-2020 followed severe weather – heat, cold, wind, rainstorms, snowstorms or lightning – within eight hours. While each type of severe weather alone could lead to prolonged outages, in combination they resulted in much longer outages.
Statewide, for example, strong winds alone led to outages lasting 12 hours on average, and heavy precipitation resulted in outages lasting six hours on average. But when wind and precipitation happened simultaneously, the outages lasted closer to 17 hours on average.
We also looked at whether socially vulnerable communities faced more weather-driven outages than other communities. In short, the answer was yes, though the effects varied in different parts of the state and by the type of weather event.
In New York City, we found that heat-, precipitation- and wind-driven outages occurred more frequently in socially vulnerable communities, including in Harlem, Upper Manhattan, the South Bronx and eastern Queens. This matters because socially vulnerable neighborhoods have higher poverty rates and lower-quality housing. Community members may lack access to health care or suffer from underlying health conditions.
On average, the duration of precipitation-driven outages was longest in areas of the city with the highest social vulnerability. In neighborhoods with vulnerability scores in the top 25% – meaning the most vulnerable neighborhoods – outages lasted 12.4 hours on average, compared with 7.7 hours in those neighborhoods in the bottom 25%.
In rural parts of the state, outages related to downpours or snowstorms were also longest in areas with high social vulnerability.
Outages are quick to follow heat spikes
As temperatures rise over the summer, it’s important for communities to consider the dangers that outages can present for disabled persons, older adults and others with health conditions, particularly in socially vulnerable communities.
With the granular data we obtained from the state Department of Public Service , we could zoom in on how fast outages began following extreme weather.
Across the state, outages began quickly – within six hours of extremely hot temperatures spiking – likely as more people turned on their air conditioners. This means the outages likely occur while it is still hot, exposing individuals to extreme heat, without power for air conditioners or fans.
This outage trend will likely continue as climate change intensifies, bringing more frequent extreme weather to an aging grid in which many parts are nearing or surpassing their life spans .
There are steps communities and power providers can take to reduce people’s exposure to power outages and the health harms that can accompany them.
In the short term, cities can develop targeted plans for these communities to ensure that residents have ways to cool off during heat waves. That includes providing ample cooling centers, swimming pools and public parks with shade trees. It can also include transportation support for older adults and others with mobility issues.
In the long term, reducing these risks means updating the power grid, weatherizing buildings, planting trees to reduce urban heat island effects and investing in distributed energy resources, such as solar power and batteries for energy storage.
We believe this work should prioritize communities that most need these updates, following the lead of New York state’s Weatherization Assistance Program , which aims to improve energy efficiency for low-income households.
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