Map of How Americans Heat their Homes
This is an interactive map of how Americans heat their homes in all counties. Each color represents the main heating source. Darker colors indicate counties with higher population density. Hover, for especific values per county. Zoom in for more details. Scroll down for more information.
Home Heating Source
U.S. Home Heating Fuel
The U.S. Census asks Americans how they heat their homes as a proxy of home energy use.
The estimates of the last 5 years are summarized in this map.
Energy use is quite important, but heating is also a main priority as low temperatures may be deadly and expensive resources may increase the living expenses of most households.
From the occupied housing units, 47% use Utility Gas for heating, while 41% use electricity for heating.
Every home in each county has a different form of heating. You can hover the map to read the exact values.
As stated on the map, the ample use of gas is not surprising because there are several gas and oil fields in North America, making it easily available and cheap.
Map of Home Price to Income Ratio by County
Alternate Forms of Heating
The map shows alternate forms of heating like coal, solar, and wood.
It is quite striking to find out that even though coal is an ample resource in the U.S., and that it was a main source of fuel not long ago, it is not the main source of heating in any county.
Nevertheless, this is not direct heating at home.
Mean while solar, is a novel and plentiful renewable source of energy.
Still solar is not as predominant as other fuel sources in places like Florida or Arizona.
Only 0.3% of occupied housing units use solar energy for heating across the USA.
Wood is a renewable source of energy but it can't be a common use of fuel in densely populated areas, or protected ones.
No Heating?
A few counties in Alaska and one in South Dakota have no information as they have low population density or are Indian Reservations.
Hawai'i has a couple of counties that have no form of heating. This is of course because it is not needed.
Non-Renewable Sources
Although electricity is used to heat up homes, it does not clarify where the energy is obtained.
Electric energy could come from geothermal processes, wind power, biomass or from hydroelectric dams to mention a few.
Unfortunately most of the electricity in the US comes from non-renewable resources like gas, coal, and petroleum. Source: EIA.
Follow Me
Resources for Heating in the United States Map
The Shapefiles for the states were downloaded from Natural Earth.
The county shapefiles and the home heating data were downloaded from the US Census Bureau.
Made by Luz K. Molina with D3.js.
This map will be updated with improved and recent information! To receive updates on this and more maps, join my email list!!!!!!!
