Colorado Documents Low-Income Energy Needs

Keeping Coloradans Warm: CEAF's Report on the Status of Colorado's Low- Income Energy Consumers, is a report just released by the Colorado Energy Assistance Foundation, a non-profit fuel fund. Using 2000 census data, the report outlines the inadequacy and uncertainty of the state's low-income energy program funding, as well as the high energy burdens facing the low income, and proposes some solutions.

Findings are:

• Twenty-two percent – more than one-fifth – of Colorado households are low income and at times unable to afford energy – an increase of 2.5 percent from the last census.
• It would cost Colorado $198 million to help all low-income Coloradans meet their home energy needs this year alone – an increase of $40 million during the last 10 years.
• The programs that help Colorado's low-income afford home energy (LIHEAP, CEAF, and Energy Savings Partners) have approximately $33 million this year, which is expected to shrink significantly in the immediate future.

Solutions include: legislation that would generate additional low-income energy funds, for example, a charge on all gas and electric utility customers collected monthly and distributed back to those in need in their communities, reauthorization of the federal LIHEAP program, increased energy efficiency and education programs, and regulatory action to institute a utility disconnection moratoria.

Page Last Updated: December 21, 2005