Air Conditioning Utility Allowances for Public Housing

1
Air Conditioning Utility Allowancesfor Public
Housing

• Meeting with
• U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development
• Entergy Services, Inc.
• December 2002

2
Home cooling is no longer considered an energy
luxury.
3
Hot weather is as deadly, if not more so, than
cold weather.
4
Even paying cooling bills does not make public
housing costs in warm weather states unreasonably
high.

• Low-Income Heating Cooling Costs
• Northeast 558 (includes 39 cooling)
• Midwest 491(includes 63 cooling)
• South 446 (includes 174 cooling)
• West 274 (includes 68 cooling)
• Source
• LIHEAP Home Energy Notebook for FY 2000
• Table A5c and A6

5
Air conditioning is not merely a luxury, it is a
health and safety protection.

• According to the Center for Disease Control,
  air conditioning is the number-one protective
  factor against heat-related illness and death.
  Not even electric fans provide protection against
  heat-related illness
• Electric fans may provide comfort, but when the
  temperature is in the high 90s, fans will not
  prevent heat-related illness. Taking a cool
  shower or bath or moving to an air-conditioned
  place is a much better way to cool off. Air
  conditioning is the strongest protective factor
  against heat-related illness. Exposure to air
  conditioning for even a few hours a day will
  reduce the risk for heat-related illness.
• One study concluded flatly that air-conditioning
  has the effect of reducing heat-related mortality
  in U.S. cities. In New York City alone, for
  example, 21 of all heat-related deaths that
  occurred between 1964 and 1988 could have been
  avoided by air conditioning.
• National Fuel Funds Network
• When Weather Kills (June 2002)

6
Entergy requests that HUD take the following
actions

• HUD should agree to pay for air conditioning and
  cooling consumption on same basis as heating.
• At a minimum, HUD should agree that in
  communities where air conditioning penetration
  reaches 70, HUD will pay air conditioning costs.
• HUD should issue an immediate directive
  explaining that HUDs ban on payment of air
  conditioning costs is not a ban on cooling costs
  and directing that LHAs promulgate separate
  cooling utility allowances.

7
For more information

• roger_at_fsconline.com