New Memphian Raquel Silva didn’t have running water for four days during the area’s mid-January winter storm.

Six months ago, she moved to Memphis from her native Brazil with her son, and the two of them live on the fourth floor of a Midtown condominium. Like many residents in Shelby County, the freezing temperatures, icy road conditions and lack of running water hit them hard. 

“We live with as little as possible these days,” she said in a text message. “I spent a lot of money on bottled water so I could shower and do everything else that was necessary. I’ve never been through this before.”

There’s been a lot said recently about upgrades to the area’s power and water infrastructure, but Memphis’ residential housing stock is also vulnerable to extreme weather because of its age and quality.

Energy efficiency upgrades are less accessible in low-income neighborhoods where residents are also more likely to rent and have less control over improvements to their windows, doors and walls, according to the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy. 

But energy efficiency is an issue affecting most Memphians’ homes, either in terms of comfort, cost or both. 

“Obviously, lower-income folks are going to be squeezed into lower-condition homes, but the majority of Memphians live in — regardless of class and race — older homes,” said Austin Harrison, assistant professor of urban studies at Rhodes College.

Nearly 60% of Memphis’ housing stock was built half a century or more ago, said Ashley Cash, the director of the city’s Division of Housing and Community Development. “A lot of our residents just don’t have enough money to make regular repairs or regular upgrades to their homes, especially if they are living in one of those older homes.”

According to Memphis Light, Gas and Water officials, at least 80 of the area’s water mains broke during the storm, and most of those failed as temperatures rose, causing the ground to shift around the pipes.

As water leaked from both the broken water mains and at least 4,000 pipes broken in MLGW customers’ homes and businesses, the water pressure dropped across the system. It left some customers with low water pressure and others, like Silva, with no water at all. 

In the past three years, MLGW has issued five boil-water advisories because of low water pressure.

“The big example is always Katrina,” Rhodes’ Harrison said. “But I think what we’re seeing in a lot of cases is an annual mini-Katrina that is negatively impacting people along racial and class lines.” 

The cost of power

Severe weather doesn’t just cause water problems, though. Historically, power outages have been the biggest headache for MLGW customers during large storms.

Memphis has fared well so far this winter in terms of power outages. The city’s energy supplier, the Tennessee Valley Authority, logged two new records for power demand during this storm, but unlike in December 2022, TVA was able to supply enough power to avoid rolling blackouts.

“Obviously, lower-income folks are going to be squeezed into lower-condition homes, but the majority of Memphians live in — regardless of class and race — older homes.”

Austin Harrison
Assistant professor of urban studies at Rhodes College

Even though many local residents made it through the storm without losing power, they may face another challenge when their utility bills come due. 

Memphis has one of the highest energy burdens in the country, meaning its residents spend a bigger chunk of their household income on energy costs than other places. 

Half the city’s low-income households spend more than 13% of their income on energy bills, and a quarter of them spend more than 25%, according to the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy.

The average American spends about 3%.

It’s a big disparity, especially considering that Memphis has some of the lowest energy costs in the country.

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The same factors that make the area’s housing stock vulnerable to extreme temperatures impact the energy burden: The city has a high poverty rate, its housing stock is old and unequipped for extreme temperatures and home upgrades are out of reach for many. 

“People who struggle with their income (and) people who are living in poverty, they are always going to be the ones that are hit the hardest when these types of situations happen,” Cash said.

She said the city’s housing is deteriorating along racial lines, and that’s “caused directly by how our city was built and the rules and the laws that were there at the time.”

Home upgrades can help — if residents can afford them

Even when not amid a storm, Cash and Memphis’ Division of Housing and Community Development are thinking about home repairs. 

Memphis’ housing stock is on a 168-year repair cycle, meaning it would take 168 years to repair every Memphis home that needs it. Typically, Cash said cities aim for a 30- or 40-year cycle.

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That’s why the city and other local agencies offer home repair programs for low-income residents. The city’s Weatherization Assistance Program is federally funded and covers the cost of energy-efficiency upgrades, such as installing insulation or performing heating and cooling tune-ups.

But Cash said a lot of the home repair programs the city funds don’t cover broken pipes. After a boil-water advisory last winter, Cash said she heard from people who made too much money to qualify for the city program but still couldn’t afford their insurance’s deductible, leaving them with few options for repairs.

One of the biggest hurdles for the city’s weatherization program in the past has been a shortage of contractors who are trained to weatherize homes. Moore Tech launched a program last year to combat that problem. 

MLGW also has a program similar to the city’s called Share the Pennies. It’s an opt-out program that rounds customers’ bills up to the next dollar to fund energy-efficiency upgrades for low-income customers. 

Equipping homes for extreme temperatures makes it safer for the people living there and cuts their power costs.

Energy-efficient homes also help MLGW and TVA. They decrease the overall demand on the system and help the utilities reliably supply power through extremely cold and hot days.

Home upgrades can also save water. MLGW turned to customers during this storm, asking them to use less water. It was a voluntary request so MLGW could keep pressure high enough to avoid a boil-water advisory.

But in the end, it wasn’t enough, and many residents were left with no water or low water pressure. For those like Silva, they unexpectedly had to spend money on bottled way for drinking, brushing teeth, cooking and washing dishes. 

“I didn’t get any help,” Silva said. “I’m in a terrible situation.”