Tempe has distributed 48 home energy kits in a pilot program to lower electric bills in several neighborhoods.

The kits were distributed to those living in the Victory Acres, Escalante and Alegre neighborhoods “because of their low household income and high heat vulnerability, median land surface temperatures and poverty rate,” city officials said in a release.

Tempe’s Sustainability and Resilience Office partnered with Retail, Arts, Innovation and Livability CDC to discuss with residents of the three neighborhoods what energy-efficient items they would find helpful.

“I'm very interested in (energy efficiency) because it addresses the economic problems that are a result of extreme heat, specifically how some families struggle to keep air conditioning running inside their homes,” said Ana Aguilar, a RAIL CDC volunteer and resident of the Alegre neighborhood.

The home energy kits, containing LED bulbs, smart plugs, utility stipends and other items, are a result of the Climate Justice Agenda in the 2022 Climate Action Plan Update.

Community members from low-income neighborhoods shared that they have to choose between paying for electricity and other necessities because the cost of cooling their homes is too expensive, according to the release.

They asked the city to work on responding to energy equity and extreme heat.

The pilot project, officials said in the release, “will feed into the larger energy equity work the SRO is planning to do across other areas in the city.”

In the fall, the SRO and RAIL CDC will discuss issues with the community to create a Climate Justice Advisory Group to focus on long-term planning around energy equity and heat relief.

For more: tempe.gov/SustainableTempe.

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