On the agenda: Ithaca meeting — Data Center (Jan 12)

Sustainability & Climate Justice Commission Agenda
Date
Time
Location
Watch Online

Item
1. Call to Order
1.1 Agenda Review
2. Public Comment
2.1 Statement from the Public
2.2 Commission Response

Monday, January 12th
5 pm
City Hall Council Chambers
https://www.youtube.com/@CityofIthacaPublicMeetings

Voting

Presenter

Time
Allotted

No

David Kay, Chair

5

No
No

David Kay, Chair

5
5

No

Rebecca Evans, Director of
Sustainability

5

4.1 Climate Action Plan Review

No

Rebecca Evans

30

4.2 2026 Commission Planning

Yes

3. Announcements, Reports &
Presentations
3.1 Updates
3.1.1 Sustainability Planner
4. New Business

5. Meeting Wrap-up
5.1 Next Meeting: February 9th
5.2 Agenda Planning for Next Meeting
5.3 Adjournment

No
No
Yes

25

David Kay, Chair

5

Introduction - Mayor ....................................................................................................... 3
Executive Summary ....................................................................................................... 3
Baseline Assessments.................................................................................................. 5
IGND Targets & Goals ................................................................................................ 5
Housing ................................................................................................................... 5
Labor ....................................................................................................................... 6
Equity ...................................................................................................................... 7
Public Health ........................................................................................................... 7
Emergency Response .............................................................................................. 7
Power Reliability...................................................................................................... 7
Climate Trends & Vulnerabilities....................................................................................... 7
Climate Risks & Interdependencies ......................................................................... 7
Climate Trends In 2024, the New York Academic of Sciences published state-specific
climate projections as part of the New York State Climate Impacts Assessment. This
section summarizes the key findings noted in the study, titled New York State’s Changing
Climate1 and is provided below. ................................................................................. 8
Key Finding 1: Average and maximum temperatures have increased in New York
State since the early 20th century and are projected to continue to rise throughout
the 21st century. ................................................................................................. 8
Key Finding 2: New York State has experienced increases in total precipitation and
heavy precipitation events, and these trends will continue through the end of this
century. ............................................................................................................. 8
Key Finding 3: Climate change is creating conditions that will increase the frequency
and severity of many types of extreme events........................................................ 8
Key Finding 4: Sea surface temperature, sea level, and coastal flooding are
increasing along New York State's coast. .............................................................. 9
Key Finding 5: New York State's lakes and rivers have experienced increased water
temperature, fluctuating water levels, and decreased ice cover, and these changes
are expected to intensify in a warmer, wetter future. .............................................. 9
Climate Vulnerabilities .............................................................................................. 9
Housing.................................................................................................................... 9
Chronic & Acute Flooding .................................................................................... 9
1

Heat ................................................................................................................ 11
Real Estate ....................................................................................................... 12
Labor .................................................................................................................. 13
Heat & Air Quality ............................................................................................. 14
Market Change ................................................................................................. 15
Migrant Rights & Job Access .............................................................................. 17
Public Health ....................................................................................................... 18
Outdoor Health................................................................................................. 19
Air Toxins (PM 2.5, PM 10, and Other Pollutants)............................................... 19
Heat (Extreme Temperatures) ......................................................................... 19
Pests and Vector -Borne Diseases .................................................................. 20
Water Quality and Reliability........................................................................... 21
Nutrition & Culturally Appropriate Foods ........................................................ 22
Fulltime Outdoor Living and Exposure ............................................................. 22
Indoor Health ................................................................................................... 23
Ventilation and Indoor Air Quality .................................................................... 23
Lack of Cooling.............................................................................................. 23
Flooding & Fungi ............................................................................................ 24
Codes & Resiliency ........................................................................................ 24
Preventative and Acute Care Access ............................................................... 25
Emergency Response ........................................................................................... 26
Sustained Blackouts ......................................................................................... 26
Telecommunications Systems ........................................................................ 26
Traffic ........................................................................................................... 27
Flooding ........................................................................................................... 29
Evacuation .................................................................................................... 29
Critical Services ............................................................................................ 31
Extreme Temperatures ...................................................................................... 32
Pushing Urgency ............................................................................................ 32
2

Homeless Population .................................................................................... 32
Health-Compromised Population ................................................................... 33
Power Reliability .................................................................................................. 33
Centralization ................................................................................................... 34
Electrical Grid Outages ..................................................................................... 34
Grid Vulnerabilities & Strengths ......................................................................... 35
Recommendations ..................................................................................................... 37
How CAP was Developed ............................................................................................ 37
Appendices ............................................................................................................... 37

Executive Summary
Communities across the country are facing rising challenges from severe weather, changing
energy demands, and growing economic pressures. In 2019, the City of Ithaca adopted the
Ithaca Green New Deal, a community-wide plan to achieve carbon neutrality by 2030 while
strengthening economic opportunity, public health, and overall community resilience.
Achieving these goals requires a coordinated, whole-of-community effort. Most of Ithaca’s
emissions result from energy use in buildings, transportation, and power generation.
Reducing emissions will depend on both lowering overall energy demand and shifting
toward cleaner, more reliable energy sources. At the same time, an emissions-only
approach could overlook pressing community challenges – such as housing affordability,
workforce stability, or public safety – services critical to municipal operations and
community wellbeing. Ithaca’s plan therefore adopts a “net-damages” approach, balancing
reductions in greenhouse gas emissions with proactive strategies to protect welfare,
safeguard resources, and build resilience in ways that can be easily integrated into existing
municipal budgets and processes. The proposed plan is intentionally flexible and designed
to be interactive for policymakers and the public. We encourage the community to engage
with the included matrix, as the recommendations vary in cost, impact, and duration.
To ensure alignment with the City’s Comprehensive Plan, downtown development
strategies, and legislative priorities, the Climate Action Plan is organized into six central
focus areas:
• Housing – Expand access to affordable, secure, and climate resilient housing so
residents can live in stability and dignity.
3

•
•
•
•

•

Labor – Support workforce development, create pathways to quality local jobs, and
encourage innovation in clean energy and business models while protecting workers.
Public Health – Strengthen community health through preventative and adaptive
measures that address risks tied to a changing climate.
Equity – Ensure that strategies are fair and inclusive, recognizing that certain
populations face disproportionate risks from both climate impacts and the transition.
Power Reliability – Guarantee continuous, affordable, and resilient access to
electricity to sustain hospitals, schools, businesses, and homes, while advancing
local energy independence.
Emergency Preparedness – Enhance readiness for flooding, extreme heat, and
other hazards by integrating prevention, response, and recovery strategies.

By anchoring climate action in these familiar and practical areas, the City seeks to achieve:
• Greater transparency and accountability
• Alignment with existing community plans and priorities
• A fair distribution of responsibility and benefits
• Broad-based public support across political and community lines
Confronting challenges of this scale requires a unifying approach. Too often, climate and
sustainability initiatives are confined to specialized staff or limited budgets, significantly
slowing progress. By embedding climate action into the same areas that matter to most
residents – housing, jobs, health, and safety – Ithaca can broaden participation, reduce
friction, and ensure steady progress.
This strategy represents a shift in practice: moving away from climate action as a separate
agenda and instead treating it as an integrated pathway toward stronger infrastructure,
healthier communities, and a more stable economy. By addressing immediate needs while
reducing long-term risks, Ithaca positions itself to advance what we call Dignity Toward
Decarbonization – an approach that unites environmental responsibility with human wellbeing, economic stability, and community resilience.

Baseline Assessments
The Ithaca Green New Deal
On June 5th, 2019, the City of Ithaca Common Council unanimously adopted the Ithaca
Green New Deal (IGND) resolution, a government-led commitment to community-wide
4

carbon neutrality by 2030 that focuses on addressing historical inequities, economic
inequality, and social justice. Two years after the resolution was sign, Ithaca established
itself as a world-leader in climate mitigation planning and continues to pave the path
forward as a blueprint for other cities across the U.S. and the globe.
The IGND Goals
The 2019 resolution laid out four explicit goals for City government:
1. Reach community-wide carbon neutrality by 2030.
2. Ensure the benefits of the Ithaca Green New Deal are shared among all local
communities to reduce historical social and economic inequities.
3. Meet the electricity needs of government operations with 100% renewable
electricity by 2025.
4. Reduce emissions from the City vehicle fleet by 50% by 2025.
The City has achieved many important milestones of progress on the IGND since 2019,
including goal #3, many of which provide critical waypoints in the development of the
Climate Action Plan.

The City of Ithaca
Around 56% of the total 32,000 residents in Ithaca are between the ages of fifteen and
twenty-nine. Cornell University itself occupies the northeast area of Ithaca, and students
tend to live in neighborhoods of close proximity, such as Collegetown, Cornell Heights,
and University Hill. In contrast, the western neighborhoods of Fall Creek, Southside, and
West Hill have a higher concentration of long-term residents.
The current 32,000 resident population in Ithaca is the result of slow but continual growth
for several decades. Recent census data even suggests a significant spike after the COVID
shutdowns in 2020, where the population grew by 2,000 residents between 2019 and 2021,
which is as much growth as between 2019 and 2000. This spike may be attributed to the
increase in working from home opportunities, which census data suggests also spiked
significantly between 2019 and 2021.
Ithaca’s large student population has a significant influence in Ithaca’s demographics. The
transient nature of students means fewer people remain in Ithaca long enough to get
married or establish families. Of the almost 14,000 total households in Ithaca, over 70%
identify as single, and around 22% as being a ‘married couple’. Contrast that with the
whole of New York State’s census data, where the difference between single households
and married couples was 50% and 43% of the total household population respectively.
5

Ithaca is a majority-white city, with around 64% of the population identifying as such in the
2023 census. There is a sizable Asian and African American population who make up
around 17% and 6.5%, respectively. Identity-based volunteer organizations to organize
events and strengthen minority voices in the community.
Housing
Housing affordability, access, and quality are concerns for both current residents and
those who would like to live within the city. The cost of housing in Ithaca has increased
dramatically over the past two decades, with the median home value rising 56% since
2014 and median rent up 46% during the same period1. Extraordinarily low vacancy rates
for both rental and homeowner units suggest that a lack of supply is a primary factor
fueling these increases. The large student population within the city and the additional
pressure it places on the rental housing market also have a direct impact on the
availability, quality, and affordability of rental units. For households with lower incomes,
this constricted market leaves very few options for decent housing that is both affordable
and conveniently located. Renters make up more than 70% of the city’s population, and
well over half of this group are considered housing burdened, paying

Labor
The presence of higher education institutions in and around Ithaca have an overwhelming
influence on the city’s labor demographics. Regarding the 2023 census profile, the
‘Educational services, and health care and social assistance’ sectors account for over 54%
of Ithaca’s working population. The next highest sectors are arts/entertainment, which
include theater organizations, sports facilities, museums, and other recreation activities,
and science/management, which include highly skilled professions in science, law, and
engineering, accounting for 12% and 11% respectively.
When viewing economic and labor statistics in Ithaca, it is important to contextualize the
disproportionate influence college students have on census data. For example, Ithaca’s
employment rate of 50% may seem shockingly low, but that’s not including the 46% of
residents marked as ‘not in labor force’ which typically applies to young adults and college
students working toward their degrees. This also throws off income data, as the median
income for Ithaca is reported to be $48,617 is brought down by the 17% of residents
reporting a household income under $10,000/year. The median income would likely be
higher if not for the college students who are not in the labor force. Contrast the individual

1

U.S. Census Bureau. 2000 Census vs. 2008-2012 American Community Survey (ACS).

6

median income with the median income for a family in Ithaca, which is reported to be
$122,065.
A Tompkins County-led study in 2025 calculated what a living wage for a single adult in
Tompkins County would look like. This included spending data for nine basic needs
categories to generate an annual basic needs budget, divided by an hourly wage for a fulltime worker over the course of a year. The study concluded that a 2025 living wage would
be $24.82/hour. This is a 34.5% increase from 2023’s findings, where the living wage was
calculated to be $18.45. The current minimum wage applicable to Tompkins County is
currently $15.50, creating a gap of $9.32. The study also determined that nearly half of all
workers in Tompkins County make less than the $24.82/hour threshold of a living wage,
and this number disproportionally applies to women and people of color.
Of the roughly 29,400 working population in Ithaca, around 15,000, or over half, are not
regarded as “workers in the area” meaning they commute from out of town. For people
working and living in Ithaca, the number of people who walk to work, take personal
transportation, and work from home each account for around 25% of the total labor force.
The 26% of workers who work from home is, unsurprisingly, a sharp increase from pre2020 lockdowns, with the 2019 census reporting only 9% of workers working from home.
Equity

Public Health

Emergency Response

Power Reliability

Climate Trends & Vulnerabilities
Climate Risks & Interdependencies
Current societal systems and infrastructure are highly interdependent. Complex systems
like housing access and career mobility are complicated and compounded by race and
class. Similarly, infrastructure we use every day like telecommunications, energy
distribution, and wastewater structures rely heavily on each other to meet our existing and
future needs. Even further, social, economic, and physical systems are constantly
7

interacting, creating a web of relationships that are intimately connected, ultimately
affecting access, affordability, and stability of each other independently and together.
Climate instability, which frequently results in events like heat waves, heavy rainfall,
frequent temperature fluctuations, and flooding, can deeply disrupt the functioning of
these structures, causing rippling impacts across systems. When these system
vulnerabilities are stacked, we experience what is called “cascading risks” or logical
interdependencies, where failure in one system causes cascading impacts on the
economy, society, and the environment for an individual or for an entire population.
Climate Trends In 2024, the New
York Academic of Sciences
published state-specific climate
projections as part of the New
York State Climate Impacts
Assessment. This section
summarizes the key findings
noted in the study, titled New
York State’s Changing Climate1
and is provided below.Key
Finding 1: Average and
maximum temperatures have
increased in New York State
since the early 20th century and
are projected to continue to rise
throughout the 21st century. The
state has warmed more rapidly
than the national average, and
winter is warming more rapidly
than other seasons. Heat waves
are expected to occur more
often and become more
intense, posing greater risks for
human health, built
infrastructure, ecosystems, and
other sectors. New York City is
projected to remain the
warmest part of the state;
northern regions will continue to be relatively cooler while still experiencing large increases
in temperature and extreme heat.

Key Finding 2: New York State has experienced increases in total precipitation and heavy
precipitation events, and these trends will continue through the end of this century. Heavy
rainstorms that lead to flooding are projected to become more frequent across the state.
8

Precipitation is expected to increase the most in winter. Lake-effect snowfall is projected
to increase over the next few decades, but as temperatures continue to rise, more winter
precipitation near the Great Lakes will fall as rain. Elsewhere in the state, snowfall and
snowpack are likely to decrease with warmer winter temperatures.
Key Finding 3: Climate change is creating conditions that will increase the frequency and
severity of many types of extreme events. Several types of storms are expected to become
more intense, with heavier rainfall, stronger winds, and higher storm surge along the coast
driven by sea level rise. Short-term summer droughts could increase due to changing
precipitation patterns and increased temperatures. Wildfires are unlikely to become much
more common within New York State due to climate change, but air quality impacts from
large fires elsewhere in North America could increase in the future.
Key Finding 4: Sea surface temperature, sea level, and coastal flooding are increasing
along New York State's coast. Sea surface temperatures are rising more rapidly in the state
than the global average. Sea level along New York's coastline has risen almost 1 foot in the
past century and is projected to increase by another 1–2 feet by mid-century, making
chronic flooding more common in low-lying coastal neighborhoods. Ocean water is also
becoming more acidic as it absorbs excess carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, although
stormwater runoff currently has a larger effect on acidity in New York's coastal waters.
Key Finding 5: New York State's lakes and rivers have experienced increased water
temperature, fluctuating water levels, and decreased ice cover, and these changes are
expected to intensify in a warmer, wetter future. Lakes are projected to experience more
severe summer heat waves and decreased winter ice cover as temperatures rise in the
coming decades. The Great Lakes could experience greater year-to-year variability in water
levels, driven by periods of drought and extreme precipitation. Flood intensity and
damages are expected to increase with extreme rainfall and broader changes in
streamflow.
Climate Vulnerabilities
The following section represents community vulnerabilities to climate change supported
by data and research that is currently available and accessible. The risks described in each
section are not exhaustive, but are an attempt to reflect some of the more pervasive
vulnerabilities that create systems of cascading risk. It should also be noted that localized
data are not readily available for all sectors or vulnerabilities. Therefore, staff recommend
exploring partnerships that will enable the collection and development of these datasets
to facilitate benchmarking and progress tracking.
Housing
The City of Ithaca’s housing stock exhibits multiple vulnerabilities with climate impacts
exposure. Namely, concern exists with chronic and acute flooding incidents, extreme heat,

9

real estate market property valuations, and risk associated with natural disasters. Hazards
related to each risk scenario are described in more detail below.
As described in the Climate Trends & Vulnerabilities section, the City of Ithaca can expect
a multitude of changing conditions that may make the city and its residents more
susceptible and vulnerable to climate-influenced disasters like flooding, urban fires,
extreme heat, and other extreme weather events. While immediate preparedness and
response protocols are essential to keeping our community safe during and immediately
after catastrophic events, it is equally important to understand how weather events can
impact other sectors of our society and how gaps in planning can influence vulnerability.

Chronic & Acute Flooding
In 2022, and again in 2023, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) published
preliminary maps indicating the severity of inundation during a 1-in-100-year flood event.
In theory, this represents a 1% chance of severe flooding in any given calendar year,
however, the actual flood risk is much more likely, with a 26% chance of flooding over the
life of a 30-year mortgage2. Today, a flooding event like this could affect 2,573 properties in
the City of Ithaca, resulting in significant property and infrastructure damage3. The extent
of that damage could vary from difficult-to-treat mold infestations to more pervasive
structural damage or, worse, to total property loss.
Even when a building remains standing after a flood, flooding can still cause significant
structural damage to a home, resulting in costly repairs and safety hazards. Sometimes,
this damage includes buckling floorboards, cracks in the foundation, or frayed and
damaged electrical wires and components. Most often, however, damage comes in the
form of mold and mildew, presenting significant health risks to building occupants. Mold is
known to grow on nearly all surfaces found in homes and growth can start on damp
surfaces within 24 to 48 hours, reproducing quickly by spreading their spores through the
air4. As mold colonies proliferate, they become increasingly difficult to control and human
health risks increase, causing respiratory problems like asthma, allergies, and infections.
People like young children and infants, the elderly, and those with chronic illnesses or
weakened immune systems are at even greater risk of acquiring severe illness from mold
exposure.
In the latter scenario, when flooding causes more pervasive structural damage, housing in
the public and private sectors run significant financial risk after a major flood event. For
example, in 2021, severe thunderstorms, torrential rainfall, and hail affected many regions
in Germany and resulted in devastating flooding. The infrastructure damage both stalled
First Street Foundation. (2021). First Street Community Risk Data V1.3 (1.0) [Data set]. Zenodo.
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5711172
3
First Street Foundation. (2021). First Street Foundation Property Level Flood Risk Statistics V1.3. (1.3). [Data
set]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5768332
4
Federal Emergency Management Agency. (July 29, 2023). Mold: Problems and Solutions.
https://www.fema.gov/fact-sheet/mold-problems-and-solutions.
2

10

rescue efforts and is estimated to have resulted in a net loss of EUR 6.5 billion in
residential buildings and household contents5, with insurers reporting over 400 “major
losses”, or those equating to over EUR 1 million in total losses to a single policy holder 6.
Perhaps more concerning, however, is the potential impact on the local affordable housing
stock and thus the instability and uncertainty of affordable housing following a flooding
disaster. What happened in Houston, Texas should be a cautionary anecdote; in 2017,
Hurricane Harvey, a category 4 storm, brought catastrophic flooding. Prior to 2017,
Houston, like Ithaca, was already experiencing a housing crisis, resulting in a severe
shortage of affordable, accessible rental homes, particularly those available to the lowest
income people 7, “80% of all housing stock in Port Arthur and Beaumont was damaged,
leaving few options for displaced, low-income families”8. Further, when publicly
supported, affordable housing is damaged, funds to repair damages are typically stretched
thin, as all emergency and rebuilding funds are typically sourced from HUD and FEMA. This
reality leaves low-income renters, and particularly renters of color, disproportionately
impacted by the effects of a flooding event. Cumulative research has shown that not only
are renters disproportionately located in neighborhoods that experience disinvestment,
have neglected infrastructure and are therefore more vulnerable to climate-change but,
renters are also disproportionately living in older, sub-standard, poorly maintained
buildings that are not able to withstand disasters. In fact, from 2015-2017, hurricanes,
flooding, and wildfires, among other disasters, damaged more than a half-million rental
units, displacing 325,000 renters9.
Most notably, disasters compound an already complex housing system, underscoring the
importance of due consideration of cascading risks. Limited housing stock, exclusionary
zoning that limits housing supply, numerous discrete recovery assistance programs with
varying timelines, and restrictions on qualifications for support all coalesce to slow
community recovery efforts and restrict post-disaster housing to those with ample
financial resources10. Therefore, communities like Ithaca should continue to focus on
inclusive planning practices, including in the upcoming zoning rewrite, to break down
historic barriers in access, equity, and inclusionary housing. Though flooding is often
Verscicherungs. Money Focus (27 August 2021). Flood: GDV significantly raises loss forecast.
https://versicherungsprofi.online/branche/assekuranz/flut-gdv-korrigiert-schadenprognose-deutlich-nachoben_01399/.
6
Fiedler, Michael. Versicherungsbote. (15 September 2021). GDV: July flood caused more major losses than
ever before. https://www.versicherungsbote.de/id/4903294/GDV-Juli-Flut-verursachte-so-vieleGrossschaden-wie-noch-nie/.
7
Aurand, A., Emmanuel, D, Errico, E. Yentel, D. (March 2017). The Gap: A shortage of Affordable Homes.
National Low Income Housing Coalition.
8
Mickelson, Sarah. (21 August 2019). Impact of Hurricane Harvey: In 2017, Hurricane Harvey Brought
Damaging Winds and Flooding to Southeast Texas. The Recovery is Still Ongoing. Disaster Housing Recovery
Coalition.
9
Office of Policy Development and Research. (2022). The Role of Housing in Climate Change Mitigation and
Adaptation. Evidence Matters, Summer 22.
10
Federal Emergency Management Agency; US Department of Housing and Urban Development. (July 2024).
Pre-Disaster Housing Planning Initiative. US Department of Homeland Security.
5

11

thought to be the most imminent climate threat in Ithaca, scorching heat waves are far
more likely and pervasive.
Heat
Known as the “silent killer” by labor and climate activists and professionals alike 11, 12,
periods of extreme heat can not only cause acute heat-related illness but can also
exacerbate existing health conditions. Sub-standard housing conditions, poor ventilation,
and the relative scarcity of residential indoor cooling compound the public health risk
faced by rising global temperatures. Elderly residents and newborns are particularly
vulnerable, especially without adequate access to cooling. For instance, between the
years 2000 and 2019, there were 6,364 emergency department visits and/or
hospitalizations due heat-related illness and exposure at home in New York State; 39% of
those cases treated were over the age 75 years of age13. These statistics do not include
emergency treatment that may have been received after heat exposure in the workplace,
during sport or recreation activities, in a public building or institutional home, or other
locations – these statistics will be discussed in later sections.
Contributing to the excessive heat risk in Ithaca, is the quality of housing, particularly
rental housing, in Upstate New York. In part, the increased risk of tenants is due to the
financial mismatch often referred to as the “split incentive” -- a situation where a property
owner is not financially motivated to invest in energy upgrades in a rental property, often
due to a lack of financial return on the investment or direct benefit to the property owner.
This results in housing units that are poorly insulated and lack the essential HVAC
upgrades to provide cooling to support the necessary quality of life for tenants. Ruthy
Gourevitch, Housing Policy Manager at the Climate and Community Institute, a climate
and economy think tank focused on policy development and implementation further
describes that the split incentive often leads property owners to seek rent increases:
“Landlords who have acquired a rental asset with a goal of generating a good return on
their investment are trying to cut back on expenses as much as possible in order to be able
to churn a profit. Cutting back on expenses means deferring maintenance a lot over time,
leading to very bad conditions for tenants. If a landlord does an upgrade {like energyefficient HVAC systems}, often their incentive is to increase the value of the property so you
can attract higher-earning tenants.”14

Powder, Jackie. (8 July 2024). Extreme Heat Hazards. Hopkins Bloomberg Public Health Magazine.
Azzi, Manal; et al. (25 July 2024). Heat at work: Implications for safety and health. International Labor
Organization. 75.
13
Office of Quality and Patient Safety, Division of Information and Statistics. (February 2025). State and
region level heat stress hospitalizations and ED visits. New York State Department of Health.
http://www.health.ny.gov/statistics/sparcs/.
14
Arnoff, kate. (22 June 2024). When Are We Going to Protect Renters From Extreme Heat? The New Republic.
11
12

12

When coupled with climate change, lack of action on housing has the potential to further
entrench socio-spatial segregation, housing discrimination, and housing exclusion15. By
raising the cost of rent in units that have received energy efficiency upgrades, like
insulation and cooling, this results in racial and class divides and contributes to
gentrification. Further, without a significant investment in building envelopes, energy
burden, or the percentage of monthly income spent on energy expenses, will continue to
rise, further contributing to the unaffordability of housing.

Real Estate
While the impact of climate change on housing occupants is notable and of primary
concern, the economic impacts cannot be ignored. Recent research has shown a national
pattern in the real estate market commonly referred to as the “climate housing bubble”,
whereby properties prone to climate impacts, particularly in flood prone areas, are
drastically overvalued16. 2023 Researchers found that, nationally, when using the preferred
3% discount rate, properties in flood prone areas were overvalued by $187 billion and that
overvaluation was most common in counties without flood disclosure laws. In fact, on
average, properties in a 100-year flood zone were overvalued by approximately 8.5% 16.
Please see the figure below for overvaluations by county.
These unaccounted-for flood risks can be attributed to a variety of factors, some of which
can be solved by generalized public education. However, some are more systemically
entrenched in state and federal systems and will require strategic municipal advocacy or
seeking alternative service providers. Namely, experts have drawn critiques of FEMA’s
Flood Insurance Rate Map (FIRM) development methodology and the stagnant nature of
FEMA’s flood modeling. For example, FIRMs rely on historical data and are a snapshot of a
community’s flood risk today. However, they do not take into account changing conditions
or how flood risk might change years or decades into the future due to increased or
decreased precipitation patterns, fluctuating temperatures, or other factors we know are
likely in New York under climate change17.

Rajagopal, Balakrishnan. (2023). Towards a just transformation: climate crisis and the right to housing.
Report of the SPecial Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard
of living, and on the right to non-discrimination in this context. United Nations General Assembly, Human
Rights Council. A/HRC/52/28.
16
Gourevitch, Jesse, et al. (February 2023). Unpriced climate risk and the potential consequences of
overvaluation in the US housing markets. Nature Climate Change. 13, 250-257.
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-023-01594-8
17
Kousky, Carolyn. (2018). Financing Flood Losses: A Discussion of the National Flood Insurance Program.
Risk Management and Insurance Review. Vol 21, No. 1, 11-32. https://doi.org/10.1111/rmir.12090
15

13

Labor
Historically, the national Environmental Justice (EJ) movement has deep roots in the labor
movement and strong solidarity with unionized workers. In the 1960s, in parallel with the
civil rights movement, the American EJ movement was led by communities of color who
sought to address the disproportionate environmental burden and lack of protections in
their communities. Many scholars, including Dr. Robert Bullard, widely considered the
“Father of Environmental Justice”18, trace the catalyst of this movement back to 1968
when sanitation workers in Memphis, TN were crushed to death by a malfunctioning
collection truck19. Supported by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the accident and the 1,300person strike that followed drew nationwide attention to the relationship between
pollution, waste, labor, and communities of color.
This deep history between labor and climate concerns was critical to the growth of the
environmental and civil rights movements and it is imperative that as climate practitioners
and advocates we continue to view these issues as deeply intertwined. Today, the labor
and economic market in the Southern Tier and Finger Lakes regions are heavily reliant on

Funes, Yessenia. (19 September 2023). The Father of Environmental Justice Exposes the Geography of
Inequity. Scientific American.
19
Stanford University. Memphis Sanitation Workers’ Strike. The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and
Education Institute.
18

14

climatic conditions and our ability to adapt to their variability. Without taking these
vulnerabilities into account, we risk susceptibility to destabilization of public health and
steady wages, as well as missed opportunities for economic growth.
Heat & Air Quality
Millions of American workers are exposed to dangerous heat levels in their workplaces
annually, often leading to cases of illness, reduced productivity, or even fatality. In fact,
outdoor workers face a 35-times higher risk of fatality from heat exposure than the general
public20. Hazardous heat exposure doesn’t just occur outdoors, however; it can occur
anywhere and during any season if the conditions are right, not just during heat waves21.
It’s important to note that some workers are at an increased risk of experiencing heat
illness or heat stress, particularly those with pre-existing conditions, the elderly, pregnant
people, and those who are not properly acclimated to higher temperatures. Other factors
contribute to a worker’s relative risk22 as well; see the graphic below and its associated
footnote for more information.

The dangers of extreme heat are two-fold, presenting both public health and economic
challenges. Details of how heat illness can affect an individual’s health will be discussed in
greater depth in the Public Health section. According to climate data, 2024 was the hottest
Gubernot, Diane M., G. Brooke Anderson, and Katherine L. Hunting. 2015. “Characterizing Occupational
Heat-Related Mortality in the United States, 2000–2010: An Analysis Using the Census of Fatal Occupational
Injuries Database.” American Journal of Industrial Medicine 58 (2): 203–211.
https://doi.org/10.1002/ajim.22381.
21
Working in Outdoor and Indoor Heat Environments. (January 2021). Occupational Safety and Health
Administration. https://www.osha.gov/heat-exposure
22
Personal Risk Factors and Heat Exposure. (2023). Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
https://www.osha.gov/sites/default/files/publications/OSHA4374.pdf
20

15

year on record in seventeen states, including New York23. With rising temperatures, the
number of hours and days when outdoor work is considerably unsafe will continue to
increase, forcing workers to choose between their health and a paycheck24.
In Tompkins County, 14% of workers aged 16 years and older work outdoors, or a total of
7,194 individuals representing over $202 million in annual earnings 25. The majority of these
workers are in the building and grounds maintenance; construction and extraction;
installation, maintenance, and repair; and transportation sectors, though protective
services also represents a large number of workers. Under the RCP8.5, or low action/high
emissions, scenario, climate models predict a total of 8 extreme heat days per year in
Tompkins County by late century; in contrast, in the most unlikely scenario where rapid
action is taken to mitigate climate change and global average warming is capped at 2°C,
extreme heat days are limited to 1 per year 26. By normalizing the RCIP8.5 trend across all
labor sectors and all workers at risk for lost wages, the Union of Concerned Scientists
estimates that annually, $6,658,508 will be lost in collective yearly worker pay26.
When these financial impacts are extrapolated over time, we can see the effects beyond
daily wages and begin to appreciate the risk associated with the number of increased heat
waves on the local labor market. If heat waves last longer in a given year and create
operational conditions that necessitate the closure of businesses, workers could face
furlough or permanently reduced hours. When this becomes a pattern, prolonged time
away may cause workers to lose employer-provided benefits, like health insurance, paid
leave, or employee assistance, exacerbating financial and health impacts 26.
Despite the risk of lost wages, job loss, and negative health effects, workers most
vulnerable to these impacts have not historically received an increase in wages to
compensate for these increased risks.
Further, because Black and Latinx workers are disproportionately represented in
occupations frequently exposed to the outdoors and extreme heat, the potential for lost
wages only exacerbates inequity in poverty rates and economic mobility, all of which result
from centuries of systemic racism25. The unjust exposure and burden of the impacts of

2024 was nation’s warmest year on record. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. (10 January
2025). https://www.noaa.gov/news/2024-was-nations-warmest-year-on-record
24
Dahl, Kristina and Licker, Rachel. 2021. Too Hot to Work: Assessing the Threats Climate Change Poses to
Outdoor Workers. Cambridge, MA: Union of Concerned Scientists. https://doi.org/10.47923/2021.14236
25
Union of Concerned Scientists. 2021. UCS Too Hot To Work Data.
https://www.essoar.org/doi/abs/10.1002/essoar.10507713.1
26
”Impacts of Climate Change on American Household Finances” (September 29, 2023). U.S. Department of
Treasury.
23

16

climate change on communities of color will be discussed in more detail in the Racial
Equity section.

Market Change
New York State is at the forefront of climate action in the United States, which was
underscored by the adoption of the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act
(CLCPA) in 2019. The CLCPA sets ambitious statewide targets for reducing greenhouse gas
emissions, including achieving an 85% decrease by 2050. However, labor growth has
signaled that New York State has been heading in the direction of clean, green energy since
at least 2016, when the state energy agency, NYSERDA, began producing annual reports.
The steady growth, and strong recovery following the COVID-19 pandemic, of clean energy
jobs emphasizes the stability and potential trajectory in the green jobs sector and, unless
the City of Ithaca and surrounding areas are poised to take advantage of these market
opportunities, the potential opportunity loss for career-seeking residents and hostcommunity-seeking businesses.
The New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, or NYSERDA, has been
collecting and reporting on clean energy job growth across building, transportation,
generation, and storage sectors since 2016. With the exception of the years spanning the
height of the COVID-19 pandemic, New York has experienced record clean energy job
growth. In fact, even at the peak of the pandemic, New York State lost only 9.6% of its total
clean energy workforce compared to the nationwide average of 14%27. Since 2016, New

New York State Energy Research & Development Authority. New York Clean Energy Industry Report 2020.
(NYSERDA, 2021).
27

17

Yorkers have seen a net 22% increase in clean energy jobs across the state, with growth
remaining steady since the pandemic28,29,30,31,28,32,33,34.

More recently, clean energy jobs outpaced growth in any other economic sector by more
than double in New York State, while also boasting entry-level positions earning 12% more
New York State Energy Research & Development Authority. New York Clean Energy Industry Report 2016.
(NYSERDA, 2017).
28

New York State Energy Research & Development Authority. New York Clean Energy Industry Report 2017.
(NYSERDA, 2018).
29

New York State Energy Research & Development Authority. New York Clean Energy Industry Report 2018.
(NYSERDA, 2019).
30

New York State Energy Research & Development Authority. New York Clean Energy Industry Report 2019.
(NYSERDA, 2020).
31

New York State Energy Research & Development Authority. New York Clean Energy Industry Report 2021.
(NYSERDA, 2022).
32

New York State Energy Research & Development Authority. New York Clean Energy Industry Report 2022.
(NYSERDA, 2023).
33

New York State Energy Research & Development Authority. New York Clean Energy Industry Report 2023.
(NYSERDA, 2024).
34

18

than the same job in comparable industries and 93% of workers anticipating career
advancement in the next 12 months35, indicating significant opportunity for long-term
careers for Ithaca jobseekers. The rapid job growth NYS is experiencing is partly due to
national deployment of clean energy technologies, and the projected deployment into
2030. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) projects between 35,370
(Regional Energy Deployment Systems (ReEDS) mid-case scenario or “business as usual”)
and 51,822 (accelerated technology deployment scenario) New York jobs in the solar
photovoltaics, land-based wind energy, grid-connected battery storage, and building
energy efficiency sectors will be needed to reach 2030 projections35.
While impressive on their own, NREL projections do not include the number or type of jobs
required to meet NYS Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act. In 2023, the Just
Transition Working Group (JTWG), a team part of the NYS Climate Action Council,
produced an update to their 2021 Jobs Study, which provided employment and workforce
analyses, economic impact models, and employment forecasts. Based on these analyses,
the JTWG projects each of the five regions of NYS will see an increase of at least 10,000 net
new “green” jobs by 203036. Further, the City of Ithaca and the Cornell University Public
Interest Technology Initiative (PiTech) produced our own modeling to determine the
number of additional HVAC installers, plumbers, and electricians needed in the city
workforce to meet Ithaca Green New Deal residential building decarbonization goals. The
statistical model showed that, at minimum, 25 HVAC installers, 18 plumbers, and 8
electricians need to be added to the workforce quarterly between January 2024 and the
end of 2030 37.
Extensive research and modeling shows that there is ample opportunity for economic and
labor growth in the clean energy sector. However, unless Ithaca is actively training,
upskilling, and retaining clean energy workers, the potential for this growth will be lost to
other surrounding areas. This concern for retention of local clean energy talent is
exacerbated when local workforce training programs do not match the goals of municipal
economic development goals and strategies. To achieve sustainable economic growth and
inclusive prosperity, it is recommended that local governments and community-based

National Renewable Energy Laboratory. New York’s Clean Energy Job’s Potential Through 2030. U.S.
Department of Energy (March 2022).
36
Just Transition Working Group. 2021 Jobs Study, March 2023: Vintage Update. BW Research Partnership
(March 2023).
37
Cho, Jason. Workforce Modelling for 2030 Electrification Goal. Cornell University Pitech Siegel PhD
Fellowship, Cornell University (August 2023).
35

19

organizationsmarket analyses to ensure local employability within the municipality of
residence is possible 38.
Migrant Rights & Job Access
The City of Ithaca has repeatedly affirmed its commitment to being “a sanctuary for all
hard-working people” 39. The original resolution proclaiming Ithaca’s sanctuary status was
adopted in 1985 during the Guatemalan and Salvadoran refugee crisis 40, and was
strengthened and reaffirmed in 2017 41 and again in 2025 42 in response to Presidential
threats of migrant deportation and incidents of reported violence. Ithaca’s sanctuary
status, coupled with a warm, welcoming culture, temperate climate, and insulation from
coastlines could make it a desirable area for migrant relocation. While concern for an
influx migrants has grown recently, numerous factor make this an unlikely reality.
However, given the local concern, the economic risks will be described briefly below.

Slow-onset climate change is considered a major driver of global migration. Within this
context, climate interacts with other variables, including lack of decent work, weak
governance, and intercommunity violence, forcing people to relocate domestically and
internationally 43. Unfortunately, in most communities, economic development workforce
planning does not account for the potential influx of migrants, or the potential skillsets and
experiences they may bring with them. This presents the City of Ithaca and surrounding
communities with a conundrum: Proactively plan and prepare for the potential increased
population with varying skills, or lean into the economic sectors that have historically
proven successful in Ithaca, limiting job-type variability in the future but safeguarding
against risk of too few resources for too many people. A lack of employment opportunities
compounds livability in other sectors, particularly in an unstable or unaffordable housing
market, stressing social services and diminishing public health and safety 44.

Better Buildings Workforce Accelerator. Program Design and Evaluation. Better Buildings: U.S. Department
of Energy (2022).
39
Myrick, S. “This is an ordinance — not just a statement — but an actual ordinance that will ensure Ithaca
remains a sanctuary for all hard-working people,” Facebook, February 1, 2017.
40
Merina, V. Cities vs. The INS: Reviving an Old Concept. Los Angeles Times (1985).
41
VI. Ithaca, NY, Sanctuary City, (City of Ithaca, 2017), sec. 215-37 – 215-46.
https://ecode360.com/32288260
42
City of Ithaca, NY. Common Council. A Resolution Reaffirming the City of Ithaca’s Commitment to Human
Rights Protection for Migrants, Reproductive Rights, and Gender Affirming Care (5 February 2025).
https://d2kbkoa27fdvtw.cloudfront.net/cityofithaca/e3680b43a22698ee37f6b1b288dabbe60.pdf
43
International Labor Organization. Human mobility, climate change and a just transition. United Nations.
https://www.ilo.org/migration-stub-9231/human-mobility-climate-change-and-just-transition
44
Chishti, M., Putzel-Kavanaugh, C. After Crisis of Unprecedented Migrant Arrival, U.S. Cities Settle into New
Normal (1 August 2024). Migration Policy Institute.
38

20

Migrant success in a new city is also highly dependent on where they’re migrating from,
their spoken language, and whether a work permit is required to gain employment. Without
fundamental language and writing skills, individuals may struggle to find permanent
employment in high-skilled jobs, despite extensive education and training. This is largely
due to the difficulties and wait times associated with receiving a U.S. work authorization,
which average three months to process 45. Coupled with limited English language
proficiency and/or low Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) scores, this creates a
nearly impossible ecosystem for migrants reentering the workforce. Minnesota migrants
experienced this first-hand, when physicians and pharmacists, despite exceptional need in
the healthcare sector nationwide, found themselves working at coffee shops or jobs where
their pay was one-third the market norm for their degree(s) 45.
Risk in the labor sector, like all others, only compounds or, in some cases, multiplies risk
in other sectors. Lack of employment creates affordable housing pressure, strains social
services, and weakens government’s ability to respond to disaster. While the current
housing and job market, coupled with transportation challenges, do not lead staff to
believe migration will become a critical issue within the City, the risk increases
exponentially with state or federal immigration policy intervention, potentially leading to
higher levels of government determining where migrants end up settling.

Public Health
The City of Ithaca’s public health landscape is increasingly vulnerable to the impacts of
climate change. Main threats include the rising risks of air pollution, extreme
temperatures, vector-borne diseases, and the stress on water and food systems. The
following section outlines the specific risks posed by these climate-related threats and
their potential effects on public health in Ithaca.
Outdoor Health
Air Toxins (PM 2.5, PM 10, and Other Pollutants)
Fine PM 2.5 and coarse PM 10 particulate matter, tiny particles that can be inhaled deep
into the lungs46, are on the rise across the Northeast the due to more frequent regional
Delion, N. Lost wages, opportunities: College-educated immigrants find many barriers to high-skilled jobs
in the U.S. (19 March 2024). Sahan Journal.
45

46

Environmental Protection Agency. (2024a, June 20). Particulate Matter (PM) Basics. EPA.
https://www.epa.gov/pm-pollution/particulate-matter-pm-basics

21

wildfires47 and an increased reliance on fossil fuel combustion during extreme
temperatures48 (EIA, 2024; Blackmon, 2022; U.S. Department of Energy, 2018). These
particles are often invisible but can have profound effects on human health, particularly for
children, seniors, outdoor workers, and individuals with preexisting heart or respiratory
conditions49 such as emphysema, asthma, chronic bronchitis, and COPD (“Air Quality”,
n.d.).
Events like the 2023 Canadian wildfire season, which blanketed Ithaca and much of the
Northeast in smoke for days, demonstrate how rapidly air quality can deteriorate50. On
June 6, 2023, Ithaca recorded an Air Quality Index (AQI) of 162, classified as “unhealthy”,
due to drifting wildfire smoke51. Beyond acute events, chronic exposure to elevated PM 2.5
levels, often caused by residential burning (trash, leaves, and brush burning, bonfires,
etc.), vehicle emissions, and industrial pollutants, poses long-term health risks52, with
health costs exceeding $800 billion per year53. Sustained PM 2.5 exposure has been linked

47

Kerr, G. H., DeGaetano, A. T., Stoof, C. R., & Ward, D. (2018). Climate change effects on wildland fire
risk in the Northeastern and Great Lakes states predicted by a downscaled multi-model ensemble.
Theoretical and Applied Climatology, 131(1), 625–639. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-016-1994-4

48

Blackmon, D. (2022, December 27). ISO New England pumps up the fuel oil again during Winter Storm.
Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidblackmon/2022/12/26/iso-new-england-pumps-up-thefuel-oil-again-during-winter-storm/?sh=2183b30b1482

49

Environmental Protection Agency. (2024b, July 16). Health and Environmental Effects of Particulate Matter
(PM). EPA. https://www.epa.gov/pm-pollution/health-and-environmental-effects-particulate-matterpm

50

Yu, M., Zhang, S., Ning, H., Li, Z., & Zhang, K. (2024). Assessing the 2023 Canadian wildfire smoke impact in
Northeastern US: Air quality, exposure and environmental justice. Science of The Total Environment,
926, 171853. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2024.171853

51

Butler, M. (2023, June 7). Update: Local Air Quality Now “unhealthy,” Health Department encourages
staying indoors. The Ithaca Voice. https://ithacavoice.org/2023/06/air-quality-alert-issued-locallyuntil-tuesday-due-to-wildfires-in-canada/

Environmental Protection Agency. (2024a, June 20). Particulate Matter (PM) Basics. EPA.
https://www.epa.gov/pm-pollution/particulate-matter-pm-basics
53
The Costs of Inaction: The Economic Burden of Fossil Fuels and Climate Change on Health in the United
States. (2021). NRDC and The Medical Society Consortium on Climate and Health.
https://www.nrdc.org/sites/default/files/costs-inaction-burden-health-report.pdf
52

22

to increased rates of heart attacks, asthma, respiratory issues, and irregular heartbeat 54. In
the United States, air pollution is linked to around 100,000 premature deaths each year 55.
In neighborhoods where residents may live near busy roadways 56, such as near Route 13
and Downtown Ithaca, or lack access to air conditioning or filtration57, the effects are even
more pronounced.
Heat (Extreme Temperatures)
Nationally, heat is the leading preventable weather-related cause of death, killing more
people annually than hurricanes, floods, and tornadoes combined58. Each year, 750 to
1,300 Americans die from extreme heat, and that number is expected to rise as climate
change accelerates59. Historically known for its temperate summers60, Ithaca is now facing
rising temperatures and more frequent extreme heat days due to climate change61.

54

Environmental Protection Agency. (2024b, July 16). Health and Environmental Effects of Particulate Matter
(PM). EPA. https://www.epa.gov/pm-pollution/health-and-environmental-effects-particulate-matterpm

Thakrar, S. K., Balasubramanian, S., Adams, P. J., Azevedo, I. M. L., Muller, N. Z., Pandis, S. N.,
Polasky, S., Pope, C. A. I., Robinson, A. L., Apte, J. S., Tessum, C. W., Marshall, J. D., & Hill, J.
D. (2020). Reducing Mortality from Air Pollution in the United States by Targeting Specific Emission
Sources. Environmental Science & Technology Letters, 7(9), 639–645.
https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.estlett.0c00424
55

Wu, C. D., MacNaughton, P., Melly, S., Lane, K., Adamkiewicz, G., Durant, J. L., Brugge, D., &
Spengler, J. D. (2014). Mapping the vertical distribution of population and particulate air pollution in a
near-highway urban neighborhood: implications for exposure assessment. Journal of exposure science &
environmental epidemiology, 24(3), 297 304.https://doi.org/10.1038/jes.2013.6
56

Chuang, H.-C., Ho, K.-F., Lin, L.-Y., Chang, T.-Y., Hong, G.-B., Ma, C.-M., Liu, I.-J., & Chuang, K.-J. (2017).
Long-term indoor air conditioner filtration and cardiovascular health: A randomized crossover intervention
study. Environment International, 106, 91–96. https://doi.org/
10.1016/j.envint.2017.06.008
57

58

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. (n.d.). Weather related fatality and injury statistics.
National Weather Service. https://www.weather.gov/hazstat/

59

Environmental Protection Agency. Climate Change Indicators: Heat-Related Deaths. EPA. (2025, February
26). https://www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/climate-change-indicators-heat-related-deaths

60

The Ithaca Climate Page. Northeast Regional Climate Center. (n.d.a).
https://www.nrcc.cornell.edu/wxstation/ithaca/ithaca.html

61

Climate Change in New York State. (2014, September). New York State Energy Research and Development
Authority https://www.nyserda.ny.gov/-

23

Between 1970 and 2020, the average number of days above 90°F in the region nearly
doubled, and projections show that Ithaca could experience up to 20 such days per year by
mid-century62. In 2023, Ithaca had an average temperature of 48.3°F63 , 2.0°F above the
1991-2020 annual average of 46.3°F64.
This marks a large shift for a city where many homes and public buildings were not built
with air conditioning or passive cooling in mind. Even homes with central air conditioning
or that utilize portable cooling units, the rising cost of utilities over the past three years has
increased the summer energy burden beyond what some residents can comfortably afford.
More information on energy burden and its impact on access to heating and cooling will be
discussed in the Power Reliability section.
Extreme heat poses a serious public health threat, particularly for infants, seniors,
individuals with chronic illnesses, and outdoor workers 65. Heat stress, which results from
the body’s inability to rid itself of internally generated heat, is the leading cause of weatherrelated deaths and can lead to heat related illnesses such as heatstroke 66. Urban heat
islands, areas with more pavement and less tree cover, lead to higher temperatures which
worsen these effects, especially in densely populated or lower-income neighborhoods67.
Residents without access to air conditioning, green space, or public cooling centers face
/media/Project/Nyserda/Files/Publications/Research/Environmental/ClimAID/2014-ClimAidReport.pdf
Lamie, C., Bader, D., Graziano, K., Horton, R., John, K., O'Hern, N., Spungin, S., & Stevens, A. (2024). New
York State Climate Impacts Assessment Chapter 02: New York State's Changing Climate. Ann NY Acad Sci.,
1542, 91–145. https://doi.org/10.1111/nyas.15240
62

63

The Ithaca Climate Page. Northeast Regional Climate Center. (n.d.b).
https://www.nrcc.cornell.edu/wxstation/ithaca/normal.html

64

The Ithaca Climate Page. Northeast Regional Climate Center. (n.d.b).
https://www.nrcc.cornell.edu/wxstation/ithaca/normal.html

65

Who is at risk to extreme heat. National Integrated Heat Health Information System. (n.d.-a).
https://www.heat.gov/pages/who-is-at-risk-to-extreme-heat

Heat and health. (2024, May 21). World Health Organization. https://www.who.int/news-room/factsheets/detail/climate-change-heat-and-health
66

Walker, J. (2024, August 13). Urban heat islands and a climate of inequities. University of Michigan School
of Environment and Sustainability. https://seas.umich.edu/news/urban-heat-islands-and- climateinequities-0
67

24

higher exposure and greater risk of heat-related illness or death68. In addition to rising
overall temperatures, rapid weather swings continue to have severe impacts. For example,
in September 2020, the Rocky Mountains experienced a sudden shift from a severe
heatwave to heavy snowfall, with a temperature drop of over 68°F (20°C) within a day,
which led to power outages and property damage69. Similarly, in April 2021, much of
Europe faced an abrupt transition from warm to cold weather that caused widespread crop
frost damage70. This abrupt transition from warm to cold weather could similarly impact
Tompkins County by increasing the risk of sudden spring frosts that damage budding crops
and threaten local agricultural yields.
Pests and Vector -Borne Diseases
As warmer temperatures become more common across New York State, the rates of
vector-borne diseases, diseases transmitted from animals to humans, are rising. Climate
change has increased temperatures in New York State, resulting in longer warm seasons
and milder winters71. These increased temperatures have increased the activity of young
ticks, which are known to be most active between mid-May to mid-August, in contrast to
adult ticks that are more likely to carry disease, which are most active from March to mid68

Mann, R., & Schuetz, J. (2022, July 25). As extreme heat grips the globe, access to air conditioning is an
urgent public health issue. The Brookings Institution. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/as-extremeheat-grips-the-globe-access-to-air-conditioning-is-an-urgent-public-healthissue/#:~:text=Longer%2Dterm%20options%20include%20expanding,more%20climate%2Dfriendly%
20land%20use.

Wu, C. D., MacNaughton, P., Melly, S., Lane, K., Adamkiewicz, G., Durant, J. L., Brugge, D., &
Spengler, J. D. (2014). Mapping the vertical distribution of population and particulate air pollution in a
near-highway urban neighborhood: implications for exposure assessment. Journal of exposure science &
environmental epidemiology, 24(3), 297 304.https://doi.org/10.1038/jes.2013.6
69

Wu, C. D., MacNaughton, P., Melly, S., Lane, K., Adamkiewicz, G., Durant, J. L., Brugge, D., &
Spengler, J. D. (2014). Mapping the vertical distribution of population and particulate air pollution in a
near-highway urban neighborhood: implications for exposure assessment. Journal of exposure science &
environmental epidemiology, 24(3), 297 304.https://doi.org/10.1038/jes.2013.6
70

71

Lin, S., Shrestha, S., Prusinski, M. A., White, J. L., Lukacik, G., Smith, M., Lu, J., & Backenson, B. (2019). The
effects of multiyear and seasonal weather factors on incidence of Lyme disease and its vector in New
York State. The Science of the total environment, 665, 1182–1188.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.02.123 ;

Climate change and health. New York State Department of Health . (2024, December).
https://www.health.ny.gov/environmental/weather/

25

May and again from mid-August to November during warmer weather72. The most common
tick-borne disease in New York State, Lyme disease, is caused by a bacteria passed to
humans through the bite of infected blacklegged ticks73 . Symptoms often include fever,
headache, fatigue, facial paralysis, and a skin rash called erythema migrans74. The Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that incidence rates of Lyme Disease in
New York State have increased from 4,615 cases in 2013 to 22,173 cases in 2023 (CDC,
2025). In Tompkins County, the number of reported Lyme disease cases nearly doubled,
increasing from 265 in 2022 to 535 by the end of August 202375.
Climate impacts are causing a rise in additional tick-borne diseases, including
anaplasmosis and babesiosis, both of which present with flu-like symptoms76. Other
vector-borne diseases such as West Nile Virus and Eastern Equine Encephalitis, which are
transmitted by mosquitoes, are also increasing in New York State. In 2024, 100 human
cases of West Nile Virus were reported outside of New York City77 compared to 64 in
202378. In 2024, New York State also saw its first case of Eastern Equine Encephalitis since

Be Tick Free- A Guide for Preventing Lyme Disease. New York State Department of Health. (2023, July).
https://www.health.ny.gov/publications/2825/
72

About Lyme Disease. (2024, August 26). The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
https://www.cdc.gov/lyme/about/index.html#:~:text=called%20erythema%20migrans.-,
If%20left%20untreated%2C%20infection%20can%20spread%20to%20joi
nts%2C%20the%20heart,performed%20with%20FDA%2Dcleared%20tests
73

74

Lyme Disease Rashes. (2024, May 15). Centers for Disease Control. https://www.cdc.gov/lyme/signssymptoms/lyme-disease-rashes.html

Jordan, J. Tick-borne illnesses jump in Tompkins County. (2023, September 15). Ithaca Voice.
https://ithacavoice.org/2023/09/tick-borne-illnesses-jump-in-tompkins-county/
76
About Anaplasmosis. (2024, September 4). Centers for Disease Control.
https://www.cdc.gov/anaplasmosis/about/index.html#:~:text=Anaplasmosis%20is%20a%2
0disease%20caused,%2C%20chills%2C%20and%20muscle%20aches;
75

About Babesiosis. (2024, February 12). Centers for Disease Control.
https://www.cdc.gov/babesiosis/about/index.html#:~:text=Babe
siosis%20is%20a%20disease%20caused,others%20have%20flu%2Dlike%20symptoms.

77

2024 Mosquito-borne Illness Annual Report. (2024). New York State Department of Health.
https://www.health.ny.gov/diseases/mosquitoes/repo rts/2024/docs/summary_report.pdf

78

2023 Mosquito-borne Illness Annual Report. (2023). New York State Department of Health.
https://www.health.ny.gov/diseases/mosquitoes/reports/2023/docs/summary_report.pdf

26

201579. Although these diseases are not currently widespread in Tompkins County,
changing climate conditions could increase their potential risk in the future.
Water Quality and Reliability
Six Mile Creek serves as the primary source of drinking water for the City of Ithaca 80.
Utilizing a gravity-fed system, water flows from a 60-foot reservoir directly to the water
treatment plant81. This system is supported by a predominantly forested watershed
covering 46.4 square miles, which plays a critical role in naturally filtering and maintaining
water quality. However, climate change is intensifying risks to both water quality and
supply reliability.
Increasingly intense and frequent storm events are likely to generate rapid runoff, which in
turn can mobilize excessive sediment and pollutants, including agricultural and urban
contaminants, into the creek82. This surge in turbidity and contaminant load poses
challenges for the overall capacity of the water treatment plant, adding costs and
operational stresses to an already delicate system 83. Contaminants in turn increase
concentrations of harmful substances and pathogens in the water, posing health risks if

79

Eastern Equine Encephalitis. (2024, September). New York State Department of Health.
https://www.health.ny.gov/diseases/communicable/eastern_equine_encep
halitis/#:~:text=Anyone%20can%20be%20infected%20with,last
20cases%20were%20in%202015.

80

2024 Annual Drinking Water Quality Report. (2024). Ithaca Water.
https://www.cityofithaca.org/DocumentCenter/View/15429 /AWQR-2023?bidId=

2024 Annual Drinking Water Quality Report. (2024). Ithaca Water.
https://www.cityofithaca.org/DocumentCenter/View/15429 /AWQR-2023?bidId=
82
Six Mile Creek: A Status Report. (2007, May). City of Ithaca.
https://www.cityofithaca.org/DocumentCenter/View/496/Six-Mile-Creek -StatusReport-May-2007- PDF
81

Six Mile Creek Source Water Assessment Report. (n.d.) New York State Department of Health.
https://www.cityofithaca.org/DocumentCenter/View/10143/Six-Mile-Creek-Source-Water- AssessmentReport;
83

Six Mile Creek: A Status Report. (2007, May). City of Ithaca.
https://www.cityofithaca.org/DocumentCenter/View/496/Six-Mile-Creek -StatusReport-May-2007- PDF

27

consumed84 . As weather patterns change, prolonged droughts85 can concurrently reduce
base flows in the creek, which may result in higher concentrations of natural and humancaused contaminants86 and impair the efficiency of the gravity-fed water delivery system.
Rising ambient temperatures further exacerbate these problems by promoting the
proliferation of pathogens and altering the natural biochemical processes that typically
help to purify the water, potentially reducing the effectiveness of existing treatment
measures87. Rising temperatures can increase the release of lead from aging pipes into
drinking water, particularly during heat waves, which are becoming more frequent due to
climate change. This raises concerns about potential lead exposure, especially for
vulnerable populations such as children88.
Nutrition & Culturally Appropriate Foods
Climate change poses significant threats to nutrition89 and the availability of culturally
appropriate foods in Ithaca. The local food system is increasingly vulnerable to climateinduced disruptions, which can compromise the nutritional quality of food90 and access to
Delpla, I., Jung, A.-V., Baures, E., Clement, M., & Thomas, O. (2009). Impacts of climate change on surface
water quality in relation to drinking water production. Environment International, 35(8),
1225–1233.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envint.2009.07.001
84

85

Friedlander, B. (2024, February 8). NYS Agricultural Assessment Cultivates Climate Crisis Solutions.
Cornell Chronicle. https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2024/02/nys-agricultural-assessment-cultivatesclimate-crisis-solutions?utm_source=chatgpt.com

86

Health impacts of drought. (2024, March 28). Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
https://www.cdc.gov/drought-health/health-implications/index.html

Levy, K., Smith, S. M., & Carlton, E. J. (2018). Climate Change Impacts on Waterborne Diseases: Moving
Toward Designing Interventions. Current environmental health reports, 5(2), 272-282.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s40572-018-0199-7
87

88

Gopal K. An EPA rule will reduce lead in drinking water-unless this effort to block it succeeds. Inside
Climate News. February 13, 2025. Accessed April 29, 2025.
https://insideclimatenews.org/news/13022025/epa-rule-to-reduce-drinking-water-lead-potentialreversal/.

Bhardwaj, R. L., Parashar, A., Parewa, H. P., & Vyas, L. (2024). An Alarming Decline in the Nutritional
Quality of Foods: The Biggest Challenge for Future Generations' Health. Foods (Basel, Switzerland),
13(6), 877. https://doi.org/10.3390/foods13060877
89

Mirzabaev, A., Bezner Kerr, R., Hasegawa, T., Pradhan, P., Wreford, A., Cristina Tirado von der Pahlen,
M., & Gurney-Smith, H. (2023). Severe climate change risks to food security and nutrition. Climate
Risk Management, 39, 100473. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.crm.2022.100473
90

28

culturally significant dietary options91. In Tompkins County, climate change has led to
increased drought, erratic weather patterns, and other environmental stressors that
challenge local agriculture92. These conditions make it more difficult to distribute and
maintain fresh produce, leading many small retailers and food pantries to rely on shelfstable options93. Such foods often fail to meet the nutritional and cultural needs of the
community, particularly affecting those who depend on emergency food programs94.
Climate change is also expected to disrupt agriculture and global food supply chains,
leading to lower crop yields, higher costs, and reduced access to diverse, nutritious, and
affordable foods in places like Tompkins County95. This increase in poor nutrition can lead
to weakened immune systems, nutrient deficiency disorders, and malnourishment 96.
Raj, S., Roodbar, S., Brinkley, C., & Wolfe, D. W. (2022). Food Security and Climate Change: Differences in
Impacts and Adaptation Strategies for Rural Communities in the Global South and North. Frontiers in
Sustainable Food Systems, Volume 5-2021. https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/sustainable-foodsystems/artic les/10.3389/fsufs.2021.691191
91

92

Tompkins County: Challenges Identified by Food Access and Security Stakeholders and Community
Members. (2021, September 29). Tompkins County Food Future.
https://ccetompkins.org/resources/tompkins-food-future-infographic-handout-9-29-21
93

Ginsburg, Z. A., Bryan, A. D., Rubinstein, E. B., Frankel, H. J., Maroko, A. R., Schechter, C. B., Cooksey
Stowers, K., & Lucan, S. C. (2019). Unreliable and Difficult-to-Access Food for Those in Need: A
Qualitative and Quantitative Study of Urban Food Pantries. Journal of community health, 44(1), 16–31.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10900-018-0549-2

94

Ginsburg, Z. A., Bryan, A. D., Rubinstein, E. B., Frankel, H. J., Maroko, A. R., Schechter, C. B., Cooksey
Stowers, K., & Lucan, S. C. (2019). Unreliable and Difficult-to-Access Food for Those in Need: A
Qualitative and Quantitative Study of Urban Food Pantries. Journal of community health, 44(1), 16–31.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10900-018-0549-2

Friedlander, B. (2024, February 8). NYS Agricultural Assessment Cultivates Climate Crisis Solutions.
Cornell Chronicle. https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2024/02/nys-agricultural-assessment-cultivatesclimate-crisis-solutions?utm_source=chatgpt.com;
95

Mirzabaev, A., Bezner Kerr, R., Hasegawa, T., Pradhan, P., Wreford, A., Cristina Tirado von der Pahlen,
M., & Gurney-Smith, H. (2023). Severe climate change risks to food security and nutrition. Climate
Risk Management, 39, 100473. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.crm.2022.100473;
Tompkins County: Challenges Identified by Food Access and Security Stakeholders and Community
Members. (2021, September 29). Tompkins County Food Future.
https://ccetompkins.org/resources/tompkins-food-future-infographic-handout-9-29-21
Bhardwaj, R. L., Parashar, A., Parewa, H. P., & Vyas, L. (2024). An Alarming Decline in the Nutritional
Quality of Foods: The Biggest Challenge for Future Generations' Health. Foods (Basel, Switzerland),
13(6), 877. https://doi.org/10.3390/foods13060877
96

29

Fulltime Outdoor Living and Exposure
Climate change poses significant risks to individuals in Ithaca who rely on full-time
outdoor living, particularly those experiencing homelessness. The city has witnessed a
38% increase in homelessness between 2022 and 2024, with over 100 adults awaiting
supportive housing97 ). This growing population faces heightened exposure to climaterelated hazards. Projected climate models indicate that Ithaca will experience
approximately six to seven heavy rain events and three to six heat waves annually by the
2050s98. Such conditions exacerbate the vulnerability of unhoused individuals, who often
lack access to shelter and essential services. Additionally, many of Ithaca's homeless
encampments are situated in flood-prone areas, increasing the risk of displacement and
health hazards during extreme weather events99.
Indoor Health
Ventilation and Indoor Air Quality
Climate change is poised to continue significantly impacting weather, likely causing
substantial increases in average and peak summer temperatures, which in turn will lead to
elevated indoor temperatures100. Increasing frequency and severity of extreme weather
events, such as heat waves, cold snaps, and storms, can disrupt the performance of HVAC
systems101. Warming temperatures are especially concerning when it comes to indoor

97

Cohen, E. (2025, April 16). After loss of SJCS shelter, Tompkins County shifts toward long-term
homelessness strategy. The Cornell Daily Sun. https://www.cornellsun.com/article/2025/04/afterloss-of-sjcs-shelter-tompkins-county-shifts-toward-long-term-homelessness-strategy

98

Climate Change in New York State. (2014, September). New York State Energy Research and Development
Authority https://www.nyserda.ny.gov//media/Project/Nyserda/Files/Publications/Research/Environmental/ClimAID/2014-ClimAidReport.pdf

99

Ithaca, NY Flood Map and climate risk report. (2025). First Street Technology.
https://firststreet.org/city/ithaca-ny/3638077_fsid/flood.

100

Zhao, J., Uhde, E., Salthammer, T., Antretter, F., Shaw, D., Carslaw, N., & Schieweck, A. (2024). Longterm prediction of the effects of climate change on indoor climate and air quality. Environmental
Research, 243, 117804. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2023.117804

Bell, N. O., Bilbao, J. I., Kay, M., & Sproul, A. B. (2022). Future climate scenarios and their impact on
heating, ventilation and air-conditioning system design and performance for commercial
buildings for 2050. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 162, 112363.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2022.112363
101

30

ventilation. Warming can raise indoor relative humidity, which increases the risk of mold
growth, particularly on sensitive materials like wood or in areas with thermal bridging.
These effects are especially prevalent in older or poorly ventilated buildings102 . Indoor
overheating during summer months may exceed thermal comfort thresholds, posing
health risks, especially for vulnerable populations such as the elderly or those with
respiratory conditions103 . As temperatures rise, the emission rates of VOCs like limonene
from household products and materials may increase, while ventilation may not
sufficiently offset the accumulation of such pollutants104. Health effects of VOC exposure
can include ear, nose, and throat irritation, dizziness, nausea, and damage to kidneys and
the nervous system105. Ozone intrusion and indoor chemical reactions could also shift,
potentially degrading indoor air quality despite decreasing outdoor ozone levels in some
scenarios106. Exposure to ozone can cause inflammation and damage of airways and
aggravate existing lung conditions107.
Lack of Cooling
As the frequency and severity of extreme heat events increases, lack of adequate cooling,
particularly in residential buildings, public housing, and community facilities, poses a
growing public health risk. Prolonged exposure to high indoor temperatures can lead to
heat-related illnesses such as heat exhaustion, heat stroke, and the worsening of
preexisting conditions like cardiovascular and respiratory diseases108. These risks are
especially acute for vulnerable populations, including older adults, young children, people
Zhao, J., Uhde, E., Salthammer, T., Antretter, F., Shaw, D., Carslaw, N., & Schieweck, A. (2024). Longterm prediction of the effects of climate change on indoor climate and air quality. Environmental
Research, 243, 117804. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2023.117804
103
Zhao, J., Uhde, E., Salthammer, T., Antretter, F., Shaw, D., Carslaw, N., & Schieweck, A. (2024). Longterm prediction of the effects of climate change on indoor climate and air quality. Environmental
Research, 243, 117804. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2023.117804
104
Zhao, J., Uhde, E., Salthammer, T., Antretter, F., Shaw, D., Carslaw, N., & Schieweck, A. (2024). Longterm prediction of the effects of climate change on indoor climate and air quality. Environmental
Research, 243, 117804. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2023.117804
105
Volatile Organic Compounds' Impact on Indoor Air Quality. (2024, August 13). Environemtal Protection
Agency. https://www.epa.gov/indoor-air-quality-iaq/volatile-organic-compounds-impact-indoor-air-quality
106
Zhao, J., Uhde, E., Salthammer, T., Antretter, F., Shaw, D., Carslaw, N., & Schieweck, A. (2024). Longterm prediction of the effects of climate change on indoor climate and air quality. Environmental
Research, 243, 117804. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2023.117804
102

107

Health Effects of Ozone Pollution. (2025, March 13). Environmental Protection Agency.
https://www.epa.gov/ground-level-ozone-pollution/health-effects-ozone-pollution

108

Kenny, G. P., Tetzlaff, E. J., Journeay, W. S., Henderson, S. B., & O’Connor, F. K. (2024). Indoor overheating:
A review of vulnerabilities, causes, and strategies to prevent adverse human health outcomes during
extreme heat events. Temperature, 11(3), 203-246. https://doi.org/10.1080/23328940.2024.2361223

31

with chronic illnesses, and low-income residents who may lack access to air conditioning
or energy-efficient housing. The consequences of extreme heat are not only physical but
also mental. Studies have shown that high indoor temperatures are linked to increased
sleep disruption109 which can lead to higher rates of anxiety and irritability while also
expatiating preexisting conditions110.
Ithaca’s older housing stock, much of which was not designed to withstand extreme heat,
often lacks sufficient insulation, ventilation, or cooling infrastructure. Indoor temperatures
in such buildings can exceed outdoor temperatures, creating potentially dangerous living
conditions111. Compounding the issue, cooling centers may be inaccessible for those with
limited mobility or transportation options112, and energy costs associated with air
conditioning are a significant barrier for many households113. This may be especially
prominent in Ithaca since as of 2024, 28.4% of Ithaca’s population is living in poverty 114.
Energy costs are also rising. In 2023, the New York State Public Service Commission
approved a three-year rate plan for NYSEG, which includes a 62% increase in electricity
rates and a 17.8% rise in gas delivery rates, which further strains the affordability of heating
and cooling115.

109

Obradovich, N., Migliorini, R., Mednick, S. C., & Fowler, J. H. (2017). Nighttime temperature and human
sleep loss in a changing climate. Science advances, 3(5), e1601555.
https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1601555

Saghir, Z., Syeda, J. N., Muhammad, A. S., & Balla Abdalla, T. H. (2018). The Amygdala, Sleep Debt,
Sleep Deprivation, and the Emotion of Anger: A Possible Connection?. Cureus, 10(7), e2912.
https://doi.org/10.7759/cureus.2912
111
Teare, J., Mathee, A., Naicker, N., Swanepoel, C., Kapwata, T., Balakrishna, Y., du Preez, D. J., Millar,
D. A., & Wright, C. Y. (2020). Dwelling Characteristics Influence Indoor Temperature and May
Pose Health Threats in LMICs. Annals of global health, 86(1), 91. https://doi.org/10.5334/aogh.2938
110

112

Nayak, S. G., Shrestha, S., Sheridan, S. C., Hsu, W. H., Muscatiello, N. A., Pantea, C. I., Ross, Z., Kinney, P.
L., Zdeb, M., Hwang, S. A., & Lin, S. (2019). Accessibility of cooling centers to heat-vulnerable
populations in New York State. Journal of transport & health, 14, 10.1016/j.jth.2019.05.002.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jth.2019.05.002

113

Ortiz, L., Gamarro, H., Gonzalez, J. E., & McPhearson, T. (2022). Energy burden and air conditioning
adoption in New York City under a warming climate. Sustainable Cities and Society, 76, 103465.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scs.2021.103465

U.S. Census Bureau quickfacts: Ithaca City, New York. (2024). United States Census Bureau.
https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/ithacacitynewyork/PST040224
115
Dougherty, M. Josh Riley Launches Investigation into NYSEG Over Rate Hikes and Transparency
Complaints. (2025, April 17th). Ithaca.com. https://www.ithaca.com/news/ithaca/josh-rileylaunches-investigation-into-nyseg-over-rate-hikes-and-transparency-complaints/article_a85f6c870f0d-4927-8369-9d02d324c092.html
114

32

Flooding & Fungi
Ithaca’s vulnerability to climate change is evident in its significant flood risk, which poses
secondary challenges to indoor air quality and public health. Flood events, intensified by
climate change, can lead to water intrusion in buildings, resulting in damp indoor
environments that promote mold growth and the accumulation of indoor air pollutants116.
These conditions can affect respiratory health and exacerbate chronic health conditions
among residents117. Important factors encouraging mold growth after floods include
floodwater depth, bathroom ventilation, roof age, structural sealing, and sunlight exposure
through windows118. Flooding can also lead to disease outbreaks, drowning, and negative
mental health impacts119.
Data indicates that Ithaca is particularly at risk due to its low elevation and runoff from
surrounding bodies of water120. As of 2025, 54.7% of properties are exposed to flooding, a
figure expected to rise to 55.4%121 over the next 30 years, compared with 21.7% in
Tompkins County overall122. Flooding can damage building structures and HVAC systems,
further diminish indoor air quality and increase exposure to contaminants that may lead to
asthma, allergies, and other respiratory issues. Vulnerable populations, including low-

116

Climate Change Impacts on Air Quality. (2025, March 27). Environmental Protection Agency.
https://www.epa.gov/climateimpacts/climate-change-impacts-air-quality

117

Climate Change Impacts on Air Quality. (2025, March 27). Environmental Protection Agency.
https://www.epa.gov/climateimpacts/climate-change-impacts-air-quality

118

Pakdehi, M., Ahmadisharaf, E., Azimi, P., Yan, Z., Keshavarz, Z., Caballero, C., & Allen, J. G. (2025).
Modeling the latent impacts of extreme floods on indoor mold spores in residential buildings:
Application of machine learning algorithms. Environment International, 196, 109319.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envint.2025.109319

Ohl, C. A., & Tapsell, S. (2000). Flooding and human health. BMJ (Clinical research ed.), 321(7270), 1167–
1168. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.321.7270.1167
120
Kreitinger, L. (2023, April 29). Vital signs of change in our watershed: FEMA flood hazard areas expand as
water rises. Cayuga Lake Watershed Network. https://www.cayugalake.org/vital-signs-of-change-in-ourwatershed-fema-flood-hazard-areas-expand-as-water-rise
s#:~:text=The%20number%20of%20residences%20and,in%20a%20flood%20hazard%20areas
119

121

Ithaca, NY Flood Map and climate risk report. (2025). First Street Technology.
https://firststreet.org/city/ithaca-ny/3638077_fsid/flood.

122

Tompkins County, NY Flood Map and climate risk report. (2025). First Street Technology.
https://firststreet.org/county/tompkins-county-ny/36109_fsid/flood.

33

income residents, older adults, and non–English speaking communities, are
disproportionately affected due to limited resources for flood mitigation and subsequent
remediation of indoor environments123.
Codes & Resiliency
As climate change intensifies, Ithaca faces growing public health and safety risks tied to
building codes and infrastructure that may not be equipped to handle emerging
environmental stressors. Rising temperatures, increased precipitation, and more frequent
extreme weather events, including heat waves, flooding, and winter storms, pose threats
to the structural integrity of buildings and the safety of their occupants 124. Code updates
that reflect current and projected climate realities, could play a significant role in
decreasing vulnerability to hazards such as mold exposure, indoor overheating, poor air
quality, and physical injury from building failures125.
Older housing stock, which makes up a substantial portion of Ithaca’s buildings
(Mendizabal, 2024), is particularly at risk. Since most of these structures were built 30 or
more years ago (Mendizabal, 2024), they were not built with energy efficiency or climate
resilience in mind, making them ill-suited for prolonged heat or cold exposure and
vulnerable to water damage from extreme precipitation (“Quality of”, n.d.). These
conditions disproportionately impact low-income residents, who often live in older
buildings and may lack resources for retrofits or emergency repairs (“Quality of”, n.d.).
Health consequences can include heat-related illness, respiratory conditions
(“Environment, Climate” n.d.), and displacement during climate-related disasters.
At the same time, the City of Ithaca’s bold steps toward climate action in its Energy Code
represent a protective factor for building stock climate resilience. The 2023 Ithaca Energy
Code Supplement requires new buildings and major renovations to achieve substantial
greenhouse gas reductions through a point-based system that prioritizes electrification,
energy efficiency, and renewable energy (Ithaca Energy Code Supplement, 2023). The
Tompkins County Resiliency and Recovery Plan. (2022, July). Tompkins County
https://www.tompkinscountyny.gov/files/assets/county/v/1/planning-ampsustainability/documents/climate-adaptation/rrp_full_plan_updated_9_27_22.pdf
123

124

Climate Change Impacts on the Built Environment. (2025, March 25). Environmental Protection Agency.
https://www.epa.gov/climateimpacts/climate-change-impacts-built-environment

Rajkovich, N. B., Brown, C., Azaroff, I., Backus, E., Clarke, S., Enriquez, J., Greenaway, B., Holtan, M.
T., Lewis, J., Ornektekin, O., Schoeman, L., & Stevens, A. (2024). New York State Climate Impacts
Assessment Chapter 04: Buildings. Ann NY Acad Sci., 1542, 214–252. https://doi.org/10.1111/nyas.15200
125

34

emissions-saving upgrades that are encouraged in the updated energy code can also
reduce a building’s climate risk: heat pumps provide effective cooling during extreme heat
events (Tan & Fathollahzadeh, 2021), high-performance buildings maintain habitable
conditions during power outages while preventing moisture damage (White & Wright,
2020), and renewable energy systems improve resilience by maintaining critical functions
during grid disruptions from extreme weather (Xu et. al, 2024). While room for
improvement still exists, particularly in relation to aging building stock and extreme
weather events, the City of Ithaca’s existing building code does promote climate
resilience.
Preventative and Acute Care Access
Extreme weather events may disrupt transportation networks, damage healthcare facilities, and

strain emergency services, limiting residents' access to both preventative care such as
acute care services (Butsch, 2023), routine checkups, and treatment for heatstroke or
injuries from severe storms. Vulnerable populations, such as the elderly (who make up
8.7% of the City of Ithaca’s population) (“U.S. Census”, 2024), individuals with chronic
illnesses, and low-income communities, are particularly at risk of experiencing delayed or
inadequate medical care during these events (“Climate Change and the Health”, 2025). In
addition to the physical damage to healthcare infrastructure, climate-induced stressors,
such as heat and air pollution, can exacerbate pre-existing health conditions, increasing
the demand for acute care services (Martins, 2024). Hospitals and clinics may become
overwhelmed (Martins, 2024), particularly in smaller communities like Ithaca where
healthcare resources are already limited. Events such as flooding, thunderstorms, and
windstorms can also impact an individual's abilities to seek care as conditions outside
might be too dangerous, or roads could be blocked.

Racial Equity
The risks associated with climate change, as discussed throughout these sections, are
further compounded by race and class, making race and socioeconomic status a key
predictor of both exposure to risk and strength of recovery from disaster 126. The
interconnections between climate and environmental risk and race have been studied for
decades, arguably beginning with Dr. Robert Bullard, considered the Father of
Environmental Justice, in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Regrettably, despite decades of
research on risk exposure for BIPOC populations, the entrenchment of systemic racism is
our existing systems continues to this day, and Black and Latinx populations remain at the
Cardona, O, et al. Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change
Adaptation: Special Report of The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Cambridge University Press
(2012).
126

35

highest risk for health and environmental vulnerabilities. This is why the City of Ithaca’s
climate action plan considers climate change an injustice accelerator, or risk multiplier,
for racial minorities and recognizes that addressing racial inequities within the silo of
climate change will produce limited results. Racial injustice needs to be addressed at its
systemic root, first by understanding the complexities and compounding nature of
exposure.
The City of Ithaca recognizes that the history of racial injustice and its systemic causes are
both complex and wide-reaching, and therefore cannot be covered in their entirety in this
document. The section below represents some of the underlying causes and results of
racial inequity and its intersection with climate change, but it is not exhaustive.
Sustainability staff have also made the intentional decision to create a Racial Equity sector
of the climate action plan to underscore its importance in climate change mitigation and
resilience programming design and implementation. However, it is important to
acknowledge that equity is deeply interconnected to issues related to housing, public
health, labor, emergency response, and energy. There is widely available and accepted
research documenting race as a predeterminant of various dangerous outcomes, which
underscores the importance of a whole-system approach to climate and urban planning.
Redlining
In the 1930s, the U.S. government created homeownership programs that systematically
denied financial services, like mortgages and insurance loans, to “undesirable”
neighborhoods and populations. Terms like “undesirable”, “subversive”, and
“inharmonious” were used to describe communities of color, particularly Black
communities, by the Home Owners’ Loan Corporation (HOLC), a program of President
Roosevelt's administration127. This practice of denying services to communities of color
resulted in the concentration of racial minority homeowners within certain neighborhoods
and was eventually banned by the Fair Housing Act in 1968. “Shirley Mann-Smith says the
problem was especially pressing in the Southside because ‘the area was redlined by the
banks. Tehy didn‘t want to lend money to people they thought couldn‘t repay it; all they
could see was money going to pot. We had fifty or sixty abandoned houses here because
even if the owners could repay a loan, the bank wouldn‘t finance them.’”128 However, the
legacy of redlining over the 30 years it was active remains today.
For example, research shows that neighborhoods and communities with a history of
redlining are disproportionately exposed to extreme heat. While there is variability in the
Nelson, R. et al. Mapping Inequality: Redlining in New Deal America. University of Richmond (May 2025).
Sisler, C. Ithaca’s Neighborhoods: the Rhine, the Hill, and the Goose Pasture (1988). DeWitt Historical
Society of Tompkins County. Pg. 108.
127
128

36

prevalence of extreme heat risk across formerly redlined neighborhoods, researchers
found that 94% of studied areas display consistent city-scale patterns of elevated land
surface temperatures in formerly redlined areas relative to their non-redlined neighbors by
as much as 7 °C, with a U.S. average of 2.6 °C difference 129.

Heat
The effects of redlining reached farther than simply concentrating BIPOC populations in
geographic areas; it also resulted in chronic underinvestment in public services in those
neighborhoods and the frequent siting of environmental hazards nearby. For example,
research from the Science Museum of Virginia on 108 U.S. cities found that previously
redlined neighborhoods experienced extreme heat waves more acutely than other
neighborhoods130. The reason for this is complex, as there are several factors that
influence why some neighborhoods experience more intense heat. Previously redlined
neighborhoods received fewer public funds for infrastructure that could decrease heat,
like shade-providing trees, parks, and green space, while heat-trapping infrastructure, like
concrete and asphalt, are rampant131. The resulting effect is redlined neighborhoods
experiencing heat waves 5 degrees F hotter on average than other neighborhoods in the
same city41. Compounding heat exposure, previously redlined neighborhoods typically
have housing without air conditioning and lack cooling centers and/or bus service,
meaning escaping dangerous heat waves is more difficult in redlined communities. In
housing units where air conditioning is available, they are often expensive-to-run window
units, which, in rental housing, landlords are under no obligation to repair or replace132.
Keeping up with the ”energy burden”, or the percentage of household income spent on
energy bills, in buildings subject to chronic underinvestment is both expensive and
impacts other areas of healthy, daily life by decreasing funds available for other
necessities like health care, healthy foods, transportation, and childcare. Recent utility
rate hikes exacerbate this issue, with local electricity and natural gas supplier, New York

Hoffman, J., Shandas, V., Pendleton, N. The Effects of Historical Housing Policies on Resident Exposure to
Intra-Urban Heat: A Study of 108 US Urban Areas (3 January 2020). Climate, 8(1), 12.
129

https://doi.org/10.3390/cli8010012

Hoffman, J., Shandas, V., Pendleton, N. The Effects of Historical Housing Policies on Resident Exposure to
Intra-Urban heat: A Study of 108 US Urban Areas. Climate (January 13 2020).
131
Cimons, M. How redlining makes communities of color mroe at risk of deadly heatwaves. Public
Broadcasting Service (January 23 2020).
132
Newsome, M. Discrimination Has Trapped People of Color in in Unhealth Urban Heat Islands. Nature (20
September 2023).
130

37

State Electric and Gas (NYSEG), increasing rates 62% since 2023 and a request to increase
rates again by 31% by 2027. Further, uncertainty remains on whether federal financial
assistance for residential energy bills will remain available into the future, as threats to the
Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) have persisted throughout 2025.
A final decision on the future of LIHEAP is expected in September following Congressional
appropriations. In Ithaca, this presents an unsettling future. The Census estimates 49.3%
and 59.9% of Latinx and Black Ithacans’ household earnings fall below the poverty line 133.
Energy burden across low-income groups in Tompkins County, the most granular data
available, varies widely, with households earning 60% area median income (AMI)
experiencing as low as 4% burden and the lowest-income earners experiencing 15%
burden 134. The American average energy burden is approximately 6%.
Disaster & Recovery
Extreme heat is the most probable and recurring hazard faced by communities; however,
the risk of natural disaster still exists, and neighborhoods previously subject to redlining
face particular dangers associated with this ugly history. The vulnerabilities to disaster are
twofold: not only are previously redlined neighborhoods more likely to experience a
disaster, they are also least able to recover from climate shocks quickly, creating an even
wider wealth gap with surrounding communities.
A recent study released by Redfin analyzed current and historic maps across 38 major
American cities, ultimately finding a positive correlation between HOLC neighborhood
scores and the percentage of homes that fell within a 100-year flood zone. In other words,
researchers found that, nationally, there are $107 billion worth of homes at high risk for
flooding located in what HOLC previously deemed “undesirable” neighborhoods, while in
formerly “desirable” neighborhoods, only $85 billion worth of homes are at high risk135.
While Ithaca HOLC maps are unavailable and thus this granularity of analysis is not
possible at the local level, the underlying methodology FEMA utilizes to assess risk shows
a consistent pattern in the City of Ithaca. In 2023, FEMA updated its risk assessment
methodology and source data to include evaluation of social vulnerability and resilience in
the event of a flood event136. These social metrics consider four indicator categories to

U.S. Census Bureau. Poverty Status in the Last 12 Months (2023). American Communities Survey 5-Year
Estimates Subject Tables, Table 1701. Data.census.gov
134
Low-Income Energy Affordability Tool. Energy Burden for Tompkins County (2023). U.S. Department of
Energy. https://www.energy.gov/scep/slsc/lead-tool
135
Katz, L. A Racist Past, a Flooded Future: Formerly Redlined Areas Have $107 Billion Worth of Homes
Facing High Flood Risk – 25% More Than Non-Redlined Areas. Redfin (14 March 2021).
136
Updates | National Risk Index. 2023. Federal Emergency Management Agency.
https://hazards.fema.gov/nri/updates.
133

38

determine the overall vulnerability score of a neighborhood: socio-economic status,
household characteristics, racial and ethnic minority status, and housing type and
transportation137. When solely reviewing the Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) of the City of
Ithaca, the most socially vulnerable communities are the Southside, Northside, and West
End neighborhoods – all of which are also within the Special Flood Hazard Area138. Further,
an internal analysis of 2022 median home values by city staff revealed that the same
neighborhoods and census tracts had the lowest assessed value per parcel 139 and the
highest density of Black and Hispanic and/or Latinx individuals living in those
neighborhoods140 presently and historically. This trend is reflected nationally, with an
$80,000 median difference in home value between Black and white Americans 141. Further,
research has shown that Black homeowners remain concentrated in formerly redlined
neighborhoods142.
On top of the acute disaster risk and the relative social and economic vulnerability of
BIPOC populations that make communities more susceptible to disasters, significant
racial disparity also exists in disaster recovery efforts. Due to several compounding
factors, including the complex and ugly history of redlining, chronic undervaluation of
Black-owned properties and neighborhoods, and underdevelopment, Black communities
and neighborhoods receive significantly less relief assistance, take longer to recover, and
are less likely to relocate to safer areas after a disaster. The underlying reason for all three
is the significant discrepancy in relief assistance, ultimately stemming from the municipal
scars of redlining and the economic turmoil that follows on the heels of a disaster.
For decades, the policies implemented by FEMA have inadvertently perpetuated the
inequities established by the 1930s HOLC maps. Research by major research institutions,
policy advocacy groups, and even the federal government has confirmed that agency
practices contributed to systemic racism. In late 2020, prior to President Biden taking
office, the FEMA National Advisory Council (NAC) shared a report with then-Administrator
Social Vulnerability Index. 22 July 2024. Center for Disease Control: Geospatial Research, Analysis, and
Services Program (GRASP). https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/place-health/php/svi/index.html
138
SVI Interactive Map. 2022. Center for Disease Control: Geospatial Research, Analysis, and Services
Program (GRASP). https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/place-health/php/svi/svi-interactive-map.html
139
Aslanis, R. and Bijl, A. Climate Justice Communities Data Compilation 2022 Findings. 31 October 2022.
City of Ithaca GIS Program.
137

140

Bhutta, N., et al. Disparities in Wealth by Race and Ethnicity in the 2019 Survey of Consumer Finances. 28
September 2020. United States Federal Reserve: FEDS Notes.
https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/disparities-in-wealth-by-race-and-ethnicity-inthe-2019-survey-of-consumer-finances-20200928.html
142
Zonta, M. Racial Disparities in Home Appreciation: Implications of the Racially Segmented Housing Market
for African Americans’ Equity Building and the Enforcement of Fair Housing Policies. 2019. Center for
American Progress. https://www.americanprogress.org/article/racial-disparities-home-appreciation/
141

39

Gaynor detailing FEMA’s inequitable practices, “{Recovery programs} They provide an
additional boost to wealthy homeowners and others with less need, while lower-income
individuals and others sink further into poverty after disasters” 143. Two specific practices
are largely to blame: the 50% FEMA Rule Appraisal and FEMA’s distribution of Hazard
Mitigation funds; both are described briefly below.
Prevention
As Ithaca is acutely aware, the ability of communities to prevent disasters can have longterm socio-economic benefits that extend beyond preserving infrastructure, like
preventing further gentrification, enabling aging-in-place, and preserving the cultural fabric
of pocket communities. Often, a community’s ability to implement disaster prevention
measures hinges on securing multi-million-dollar grants facilitated by FEMA, like the flood
mitigation project in the City of Ithaca. The challenge with securing these large grants is
threefold and continuously puts lower-income and communities of color at a
disadvantage. At the forefront, the application process for large grants can be a deterrent
for many communities, as federal applications are often tedious, time-consuming, and
require specialized expertise and planning. In municipalities already struggling financially,
these hurdles can be too costly to bear and prevent either successful funding or
application altogether. Further compounding the issue, hazard mitigation grants require a
local match to disburse funds, which many communities with limited capital funds, like
Ithaca, simply cannot afford.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the distribution of mitigation funds is particularly
concerning and pervasive. Because demand for hazard mitigation funds far exceeds their
availability, FEMA has implemented a methodology to determine how to distribute funds
based on a cost-benefit analysis. Under FEMA’s cost-benefit methodology, benefits are
equal to the anticipated damages without mitigation funds, minus estimated damages
with mitigation measures144 . The analysis considers public infrastructure and services,
physical damage, temporary housing costs, loss of business income, and similar costs
that would otherwise be avoided through disaster prevention measures. However, in
communities without high business production, low home valuation, and aging
National Advisory Council Report to the FEMA Administrator. November 2020. U.S. Department of
Homeland Security. https://cdn.prod.websitefiles.com/635adac789d0118ea58622fb/635adac789d01139788625db_National%20Advisory%20Council%2
0Report%20to%20the%20FEMA%20Administrator%202020.pdf
143

Engineering Principles and Practices for Retrofitting Flood-Prone Residential Structures. Appendix B:
Understanding the FEMA Benefit-Cost Analysis Process. 2012. U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
https://data.wvgis.wvu.edu/pub/RA/_resources/Archive/Mitigation/NonStructural/fema259_complete_rev.p
df
144

40

infrastructure - all lingering symptoms of redlining and limited capital funds - the monetary
value and representation of “benefit“ of protecting those resources is categorically
undervalued. Thus, by FEMA’s own methodological design, low-income and Black
communities receive fewer hazard mitigation funds, making them more vulnerable to
disasters and less likely to recover. While we cannot determine if this methodology
ultimately impacted the amount of funding Ithaca has or will receive through FEMA grants,
it is worth noting that the structural issues created by redlining nearly 100 years ago still
persist today and may ultimately affect the capacity for resilience in the future.
Recovery
In the unfortunate scenario that a community experiences a natural disaster, equity
concerns also proliferate within FEMA’s allocation of recovery funds. The most common
aid provided by FEMA, the Individuals and Households Program (IHP), assists uninsured or
under-insured households affected by disaster with financial assistance and direct
services. Assistance includes funds for temporary housing or to repair owner-occupied
homes. However, like most FEMA programs, the demand for assistance far exceeds the
fund balance, which requires FEMA to use an allocation methodology to distribute
resources.
Two primary themes are revealed when assessing the distribution of FEMA funds: Black
households face disproportionate obstacles to receiving resources, and renters receive
considerably fewer funds than property owners. There is also significant overlap between
the themes, with 56% of Black Americans renting their homes.
One of the allocation methodologies fueling the disproportionate distribution of funds is
the 50% Rule Appraisal, which assigns disaster aid based on property values prior to a
weather event. Research has found that homes in Black neighborhoods are valued
approximately 21-23% below what they would be in non-Black neighborhoods145. The
reason for undervaluation is systemic, but can be traced back to the history of redlining
and how many appraisers were trained to execute their job functions, according to 2022
testimony from Lisa Rice, President of the National Fair Housing Alliance146. Further, in
November 2022, the New York Times reported that racial inequality in home appraisals has
increased 75% in the past decade147. With the intensity and frequency of storms increasing

Rothwell, J. and Perry, A. How racial bias in appraisals affects the devaluation of homes in majority-Black
neighborhoods. 5 December 2022. Brookings Institution. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/how-racialbias-in-appraisals-affects-the-devaluation-of-homes-in-majority-black-neighborhoods/
146
Rice, L. Devalued, Denied, and Disrespected: How Home Appraisal Bias and Discrimination Are Hurting
Homeowners and Communities of Color. 29 March 2022. National Fair Housing Alliance: Testimony before
the U.S. House Committee on Financial Services.
147
Kamin, D. Widespread Racial Bias Found in Home Appraisals. 2 November 2022. New York Times.
145

41

due to climate change, communities can expect damage to public and personal property.
The ability to recover from storms and other natural disasters is a necessary component of
fostering resilient communities, and current systemic structures are prohibitively complex
or burdensome, preventing communities of color from equally accessing available
resources.
Wealth & Community Building
Economic security has long been defined by the ability to obtain a good-paying job, and
has been the foundation of our country’s political and social framework. Often, steady
career growth begins early, and has positive implications for an individual’s future health,
economic status, and academic outcomes. However, even in times of nation-wide
economic success, communities of color still face more challenges to landing stable jobs
than their white counterparts148. Further, labor market research reveals that even despite
recent successes in increasing workers’ access to jobs, and actually securing more jobs,
specific “labor market outcomes – including higher unemployment and fewer good jobs –
continue to be worse for African American workers and their families”149. ”Good jobs” can
be somewhat vague, however Black workers have historically earned lower wages than
white workers and have fewer employer-provided benefits, increasing overall costs of
living. A study by the Employee Benefits Research Institute in 2018 found that Black
American workers were 14% less likely than white workers to have any type of retirement
plan through their employer, making it difficult for communities of color to build
community and generational wealth150. For these reasons, it is essential to incorporate
workforce programming rooted in equity and wealth building, and that removes the
systemic hurdles that have historically prevented communities of color from building
wealth.
While family and individual wealth-building within communities of color are important,
there are other indicators of equity and access that deserve equal attention in program
planning. Community-building, a term that is frequently used to describe the non-physical

148

Reid, L. Integrating Economic Dualism and Labor Market Segmentation: The Effects of Race, Gender, and

Structural Location on Earnings, 1974-2000 (2016). The Sociological Quarterly, 44(3).
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1533-8525.2003.tb00539.x
Weller, C. African American Face Systematic Obstacles to Getting Good Jobs (2019). Center for American
Progress. https://www.americanprogress.org/article/african-americans-face-systematic-obstacles-gettinggood-jobs/
150
Copeland, C. Current Population Survey: Checking in on the Retirement Plan Participation and Retiree
Income Estimates (2019). Employee Benefits Research Institute. https://www.ebri.org/content/currentpopulation-survey-checking-in-on-the-retirement-plan-participation-and-retiree-income-estimates
149

42

aspects of development – including organizational capacity building, the changing of
decision-making systems, or resource allocation processes – is one such example.
Historically, exclusionary practices, like over policing in communities of color,
underinvestment in public infrastructure, or targeting of poor communities for undesirable
development has eroded trust between the public and government. Research conducted
by Building Bridges, a project of the Dorothy Cotton Institute, confirmed in 2020 and 2021
that local communities of color in Ithaca also experienced various levels of distrust with
local government. In order to repair the eroded trust created by generations of
underinvestment and exclusion at varying levels of government, it is essential that local
governments begin to rebuild systems previously used as weapons of oppression. Further,
communities of color must not only have input, but lead these efforts to ensure that true
accessibility, inclusion and equity are represented both in process and implementation.

Emergency Response
Emergency preparedness is perhaps the most visible component of climate planning.
However, we advocate that emergency response does not begin or end with onsite crisis
management. A thoughtful emergency plan includes robust risk assessments, resource
inventories, delegation, onsite management, and recovery efforts. The sections below do
not attempt to fill any of these responsibilities; rather, they point out some of the risks
present in the City. To appropriately develop an emergency response plan, the City should
work in consultation with an Emergency Manager and existing first responders to complete
comprehensive risk assessments based on present and future conditions and capacity.
Sustained Blackouts
With climate change expected to increase the frequency and severity of storms and
extreme temperature swings, the risk of sustained blackouts can also be expected to
increase over time. The City’s ambitious electrification goals, while a powerful step
towards climate change mitigation, can also potentially increase the risk of sustained
blackouts by increasing reliance on electricity for power generation (Electrify Ithaca, n.d.;
Majowicz et al., 2024). Communication and mobility can be life-or-death in emergency
situations, including sustained blackouts. Because of this, ensuring the consistent
performance of telecommunications systems and the smooth movement of traffic during
blackouts in the City of Ithaca is a critical task.
Telecommunications Systems
Telecommunications systems have a massive impact on everyday life and are heavily
dependent on electricity. Sustained blackouts can cause cascading failures in
43

telecommunication systems, from large-scale infrastructure like towers to individual cell
phones and radios, if backup power is unavailable (Kraussman et al., 2017; Pescaroli et al.,
2017). In recent years, emergency responders have become increasingly reliant on
electricity-dependent telecommunications systems, particularly cell phones and two-way
radios (Kraussman et al., 2017). Beyond emergency responders, telecommunications
systems are also crucial to disseminate health and safety information to the public, such
as boil water advisories or shelter-in-place orders. Thus, sustained blackouts present a
major risk to emergency response efficacy, such as delays in ambulance dispatch, patient
triage, and transport to healthcare facilities, resulting in increased morbidity and mortality,
particularly for time-sensitive conditions like cardiac and respiratory events or trauma.
The City of Ithaca contains 176 registered cell towers; the largest number of these towers
are registered by Cornell University, Tompkins County Department of Emergency
Response, and Saga Communications, LLC, respectively (Cell Tower Maps, n.d.). The high
number of cell towers in the City of Ithaca is a protective factor in sustained blackout
scenarios. In the event of a sustained blackout, having network redundancy through
multiple towers means that if one tower fails, others can potentially maintain coverage in
the area. Additionally, cell towers do have backup power that can last for up to 48 hours.
During a sustained blackout that exceeds 48 hours of power loss, however, the high level
of dependence of cell towers on electricity presents a major risk to critical
communications.
Radio communications are another important component of telecommunication systems.
Within the City of Ithaca, there are four FCC-registered radio towers and 32 radio stations
within close listening range, including several key community radio stations such as WRFI,
WICB, and WVBR (Radio-Locator, n.d.). As with cell towers, redundancy in radio
infrastructure and stations represent protective factors during sustained blackouts. In
previous disaster scenarios in several different contexts, amateur radio has been a major
lifeline for emergency communication after other systems failed (Gill, 2019). At the same
time, radio telecommunications systems are also heavily dependent on electricity and
face additional issues with technical failures (such as software crashes and equipment
malfunctions), physical damage, network congestion, and limited coverage during disaster
scenarios (Debnath et al., 2022). Ensuring backup power and redundancy within radio
systems is key for emergency planning.
Traffic
Sustained blackouts can also impact mobility and traffic patterns. According to 2023 data
from the Ithaca-Tompkins County Transportation Council, Route 13 at 3 rd Street had the
highest overall traffic volume, with additional heavy traffic points along 13 at Elmira Road,
44

Fulton Street, and Meadow Street. Additional roadways with high traffic volume included
Elmira Road, Spencer Street, and Route 79 (2023 Traffic Count Report, 2024). Sustained
blackouts can cause failures in traffic lights and light control infrastructure, exacerbating
traffic congestion and slowing response time for ambulances, fire trucks, law
enforcement, and other emergency responders (Lu et al., 2020). Disruptions to traffic light
systems can also lead to accidents and worsened air quality from car idling. Concurrent
emergencies such as wildfires and storms could further worsen traffic congestion during
sustained blackouts.
Households can also face risk from traffic disruption during emergency situations, as
congestion also slows down evacuation from disaster-impacted areas. Owners of electric
vehicles (EVs) must also consider the logistics of charging essential fleet vehicles during
evacuations. The City of Ithaca has a total of 38 EV charging stations (Alternative Fuels
Data Center, 2025). Of these stations, 4 are free of charge and 4 stations are DC fast
chargers, with a combined total of 20 fast charging ports (Alternative Fuels Data Center,
2025). Especially in an evacuation scenario where a high volume of drivers can be
expected to use similar routes to exit the city, the capacity of the EV charging network may
not be enough to meet demand. At the same time, in rare cases, damage to EV charging
infrastructure could potentially lead to fires (Electric vehicles and flooding, 2024). For
these reasons, the location of electric vehicle charging infrastructure is a key
consideration in emergency response planning.

45

Flooding
As climate change increasingly impacts the City of Ithaca, flood severity and frequency can
be expected to increase. More flooding presents a significant risk to the health, safety, and
property of Ithaca residents. Flood conditions can rapidly transform streets into
waterways, damage homes and businesses, and create hazardous conditions that require
complex emergency response.
Evacuation
Timely evacuation during a major flood can mean the difference between life and death.
Refusing or being unable to evacuate isolates people physically, presents major
challenges for caring for vulnerable loved ones, and may pose grave physical danger to
those who shelter in place (Haynes et al., 2018). Successful large-scale flood emergency
response, including evacuation, relies on coordinated decision-making by local
emergency management officials. The Department of Homeland Security recommends
that municipalities plan for floods by creating evacuation zones based on hazard exposure,
evacuate communities together to promote social support, disperse evacuees throughout
46

the community to reduce the burden on individual locations, and communicate safe
evacuation routes to community members (Evacuation and Shelter-in-Place Guidance,
2019). Planning for evacuations should also prioritize maintaining access to hospitals and
other healthcare facilities. As it currently stands, neither the City of Ithaca nor Tompkins
County has any identified flood evacuation zones or routes, despite a robust
understanding of hydrologic flood risk in the area (Tompkins County Resiliency and
Recovery Plan, 2022). Furthermore, Tompkins County has nearly 30 miles of major
roadways exposed to the 1% annual chance flood event (Tompkins County Hazard
Mitigation Plan-Flood, 2021). The lack of identified flood evacuation zones and routes may
slow or prevent a coordinated response during a major flood event, which significantly
increases community flood risk.
One group that faces unique challenges during flood emergency evacuations are
community members with disabilities. In Ithaca, approximately 7.7% of the population
under 65 has a disability, with another 8.7% aged 65 or older (U.S. Census Bureau
QuickFacts, 2023). Municipal emergency departments across the country improve
response by maintaining voluntary emergency contact lists for disabled individuals (U.S.
Department of Homeland Security, 2025). Such registry programs help responders locate
and assist people with disabilities during natural disasters. As of 2025, Tompkins County
lacks this specific service for Ithaca residents despite providing general flood emergency
assistance (Tompkins County Department of Social Services, 2025). Different disabilities
also require tailored accommodations in emergency procedures.
Mobility-impaired people face many barriers in flood emergency evacuation situations,
including loss of assistive devices and medical equipment, lack of access to transit,
inaccessible emergency shelters, and difficulty evacuating high-rise buildings. Such
barriers are worsened by floodwaters or debris blocking roads and shelters (Raja &
Narasimhan, 2022). People with other disabilities also encounter significant barriers to
accessing and receiving timely emergency response services during flood events. People
with sensory disabilities (including blindness, deafness, and speech impairments) face
challenges in accessing warnings, navigating unfamiliar environments, and
communicating with emergency responders. Individuals with cognitive disabilities may
struggle with understanding or remembering instructions and emergency contact
information, making it difficult to follow evacuation instructions or access services during
disasters (Raja & Narasimhan, 2022).
Within the City of Ithaca, major roadways identified by the county as common evacuation
routes (including Routes 13, 79, 96, 34 and 89) can be expected to be flooded in the event
of a major flood (Tompkins County Hazard Mitigation Plan-City of Ithaca, 2021; National
47

Flood Hazard Layer Map Viewer, 2025). Accessible information about safe alternative
evacuation routes, emergency procedures, and shelter locations can save the lives of
people with disabilities by expediting emergency response (Fox et al., 2007). This
information can and should come in multiple formats, including but not limited to signage,
route maps, audio announcements, braille materials, simplified text with visual aids,
digital applications with screen reader compatibility, and direct outreach through
community-based organizations serving people with disabilities in Ithaca (National
Council on Disability, 2005). A lack of specified evacuation routes and outreach puts
disabled community members further at risk to adverse impacts from floods and other
natural hazards.
Another disproportionately vulnerable group during flood events is individuals experiencing
homelessness. Flood evacuation for the homeless community presents challenges since
they frequently live in marginal, flood-prone areas, often lack access to emergency
warning systems, and have higher rates of chronic diseases that can be worsened by
floods and wet weather (Every, 2016; Ramin & Svoboda, 2009). Additional health and
socioeconomic burdens further complicate emergency response during floods for
individuals experiencing homelessness. Poverty, substance abuse, and mental illness that
are common in the homeless population can prevent people from engaging with
emergency response efforts or services that are often complex and difficult to navigate,
increasing risk (Every et al., 2019). Lastly, a lack of knowledge about the location and
number of individuals in the homeless populations in Ithaca presents a major barrier to
effective flood planning or evacuation.
The most recent Ithaca/Tompkins County Point in Time Count of the homeless population
(from January 25th, 2024) counted 210 total homeless persons in the county, with 16
people totally unsheltered (U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, 2024). At
the same time, other reporting places the population of the encampment located on the
City-owned parcel in the southwest, at 20 to 60 people alone; these numbers may have
changed since the city began clearing the area in May 2024 (Jordan, 2023; Lucas, 2024).
The absence of comprehensive data on the locations and numbers of people experiencing
homelessness creates a critical gap in flood evacuation planning, significantly hampering
emergency responders' ability to locate and assist this vulnerable population during flood
events.
Critical Services
Water supplies are vulnerable to damage from flood events. Severe flooding can worsen
groundwater quality and destroy supply infrastructure such as pumping stations (Barbetta
et al., 2022). Factors that contribute to the flood risk of municipal infrastructure include
48

flood susceptibility, weather, population density, average road density, and average
degree of imperviousness (Santos et al., 2020). One major protective factor in the City of
Ithaca is the risk assessment that Tompkins County completed for its 2021 Hazard
Mitigation Plan. This plan identified one wastewater pumping station within the City of
Ithaca’s 1% annual chance floodplain and an additional potable water tank and
wastewater treatment facility in the City’s 0.5% annual chance floodplain (Tompkins
County Hazard Mitigation Plan-Flood, 2021, pp. 5.4.4-45-46). In a changing climate, the
City’s floodplains may expand in the future, posing more of a risk.
Flood events can make it more difficult to access hospitals and reduce the mobility of
emergency responders like ambulances, the fire department, and law enforcement. The
2021 Hazard Mitigation Plan determined that the City of Ithaca can expect 9,604 tons of
debris to be generated by the 1% annual chance flood event (Tompkins County Hazard
Mitigation Plan-Flood, 2021, p. 5.4.4-42). Debris of this magnitude could realistically block
roads and prevent members of the community from accessing hospitals or other critical
facilities. According to the Hazard Mitigation Plan, the City of Ithaca had 3 critical facilities
located in the 1% annual chance floodplain (1.5% of all critical facilities) and 30 critical
facilities located in the 0.5% annual chance floodplain (14.9% of all critical facilities) as of
2020 (Tompkins County Hazard Mitigation Plan-Flood, 2021, pp. 5.4.4-45-46).
Furthermore, modeling produced by City of Ithaca contractors shows that vehicles from
one of the major emergency service providers in the City of Ithaca, Bangs Ambulance, may
be unable to exit their facility’s driveway in the event of a flood, and that all surrounding
streets would be blocked by high water. Damage to critical facilities can contribute to
cascading failures, worsen disaster impacts, and threaten community life safety (see
"Preventative and Acute Care Access" in the Public Health section of this document for
more information).
Extreme Temperatures
Climate change can influence temperatures at both extremes—heat and cold.
Atmospheric warming increases the frequency and intensity of heat waves. At the same
time, disruption of atmospheric patterns like the polar vortex can lead to more severe cold
snaps in certain areas, creating unpredictable winter conditions despite an overall
warming trend. As a lakefront city in the northeastern United States, the City of Ithaca must
consider both extreme heat and extreme cold in its climate change adaptation policy.
Pushing Urgency
Heat waves kill more people annually than floods, tornadoes, and earthquakes combined
(Adams-Fuller, 2023). Mere exposure to extreme heat can lead to heat stroke, which has
cascading mental and physical impacts (Seltenrich, 2015). According to the County’s 2021
49

Hazard Mitigation Plan, the Ithaca area may experience more frequent days over 90°F,
potentially increasing from 10 to 23 days annually depending on the climate change
scenario (Tompkins County Hazard Mitigation Plan-Extreme Temperatures, 2021, pp.
5.4.3-6-7). Extreme cold temperatures are also a dangerous natural hazard. Hypothermia
is a major risk during cold snaps, and existing respiratory health problems are exacerbated
by cold (Seltenrich, 2015). Extreme temperatures can also lead to other hazards, such as
fires and drought with extreme heat and power outages with extreme cold, creating
simultaneous emergencies.

Homeless Population
As mentioned previously, a lack of access to emergency warning systems, higher chronic
disease rates, and inadequate data about the location of individuals experiencing
homelessness make extreme temperatures a major risk to the life safety of people
experiencing homelessness. Unsheltered individuals are at significant risk for developing
hypothermia during cold snaps and hyperthermia during heat waves (Bezgrebelna et. al,
2021; Noor et. al, 2025). Emergency response for the homeless community remains a
challenge during extreme temperature events. Physical, social, and psychological
challenges can prevent the homeless community from accessing shelters during cold
snaps or cooling centers during heat waves (Bezgrebelna et. al, 2021). While no specific
data has been collected about the City of Ithaca, research indicates that during heat waves
in particular, emergency department admissions of people experiencing homelessness
may significantly increase (Noor et. al, 2025). At the same time, the same persistent
challenges that prevent individuals experiencing homelessness from accessing shelters
and cooling centers can also prevent them from seeking out necessary medical care
(Koehler, 2021). Unsheltered individuals in the City of Ithaca represent one of the highest
risk populations during extreme temperatures.
Health-Compromised Population
Extreme temperature can exacerbate existing health problems. People who are above the
age of 65, have chronic diseases or drug and alcohol use disorders, experience social
isolation, or live in areas with little tree cover are significantly more likely to be hospitalized
or experience adverse health outcomes during extreme temperature events (Hess, 2023;
Layton et. al, 2020; Seltenrich, 2015). Physical health factors, social connection, and the
built environment all contribute to heat risk for health-compromised people in the City of
Ithaca. Extreme cold also presents risk to health-compromised individuals. Many
Tompkins County residents suffer from chronic diseases. Data from 2020-2022 indicates
that Tompkins County had an age-adjusted chronic lower respiratory disease mortality rate
50

(33.2%) higher than the statewide rate (23.7%). On the other hand, the County had lower
mortality and hospitalization rates than the state for asthma and all tracked cardiovascular
diseases (New York State Health Indicators by Race and Ethnicity, 2020-2022, n.d.;
Tompkins County Health Indicators by Race and Ethnicity, 2020-2022, n.d.). Targeting
chronically ill populations in emergency response is crucial to saving lives during extreme
temperatures.

Power Reliability
The reliability of electricity has implications that extend beyond daily household
convenience. U.S. infrastructure like telecommunications, hospitals and medical
facilities, the economy, and transportation all rely heavily on the stability of the grid and
distribution infrastructure. Simultaneously, the U.S., New York State, and the City of Ithaca
are rapidly moving toward increasing reliance on electricity and decreasing dependency on
fossil fuels for both equity and environmental reasons. For outdated infrastructure
unprepared to meet this increasing demand, this presents new strains on our electricity
infrastructure and limitations to social and economic growth. These strains are only
exacerbated by changes in weather patterns anticipated as a result of climate change,
including shifts in seasonal peaks, natural disasters, and an increase in the number and
severity of storms that can damage infrastructure.
In the event of a power outage, most localities are unprepared to sustain critical
infrastructure beyond a couple of a days and, instead, rely on utility companies to restore
power quickly. As recently as 2024, a severe thunderstorm disrupted power for thousands
of Ithaca and Tompkins County residents for 72 hours. Because of the increasing reliance
on electricity for our daily lives and for our most critical services, it is essential that the City
think proactively about decentralizing and diversifying power resources to fill in the gaps in
identified vulnerability gaps.
Centralization
The majority of electricity in the United States is generated at large-scale, centralized
facilities that are connected through a network of high-voltage transmission lines and
distributed to end-users. While there are many kinds of centralized facilities, most of them
produce electricity through the combustion of fossil fuels, like natural gas. Ithaca’s
electricity network is somewhat unique, with approximately half of our electricity
production coming from carbon-free sources like hydropower and nuclear151. While the
centralized nature of power distribution is more efficient and economically beneficial for
151

NYISO. Power System Fundamentals. 2020. New York Independent Systems Operator.

51

utility companies, it also presents unique challenges that increase vulnerability for
customers. One such example is the power lost as electrical energy travels from the point
it was generated to its end-use – also known as transmission loss. In New York, we assume
a loss rate of just over 7%152. This loss rate represents excess greenhouse gas emissions,
real power, and economic losses, and reflects one of the drawbacks of a principally
centralized power system. However, there are other examples of downsides to centralized
power.
Customer Cost & Choice
The costs associated with a centralized power system have both positive and negative
implications. On the one hand, the costs of transmission and distribution infrastructure
upgrades are extremely expensive. For example, NYSEG, Ithaca’s electric grid operator, is
forecasted to spend approximately $294.7M in electric and generation capital investment
for calendar year 2025153. The U.S. Energy Information Administration estimates that
across the U.S., spending by major utilities has increased 12% between 2003 and 2023
based on FERC data, likely due to the replacement of aging infrastructure, introduction of
automated systems like smart meters and sensors, and new line installation154. On the
surface, the cost of these necessary upgrades appears antithetical to customer cost
control, but in reality, these costs are socialized across large service territories. NYSEG, for
example, serves more than 40% of New York State and nearly 1,000,000 customers,
meaning the $294.7M in capital costs is distributed across all 1M customers, theoretically
saving residents money.
However, this socialization structure is not always fair. Major users, like data centers,
require far more capital investment in the grid to accommodate their supersized electric
loads. Hyperion, for example, Meta’s latest datacenter project in Louisiana, is projected to
have a peak demand of 5GW, about half the demand of New York City155. In this scenario,
Meta is the sole driver of the costly upgrades required to operate the new facility. However,
there is little transparency around Meta’s financial responsibility for the upgrades versus

Hammer, H. Projected Emissions Factors for New York State Grid Electricity. August 2022. New York State
Energy Research & Development Authority.
153
NYSEG and RG&E. NYSEG and RG&E Capital Investment Plan Quarterly Variance Report Q3 2025. 17
November 2025. Submitted to the NY Public Service Commission as part of cases 22-E-0317, 22-G-0318, 22E-0319, and 22-G-0320.
154
U.S. Energy Information Administration and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. Grid infrastructure
investments drive increase in utility spending over past two decades. 18 November 2024. U.S. Energy
Information Administration.
155
Thomas, M. These Data Center Are Getting Really, Really Big: Gigawatt-sized data centers are becoming
the new normal. 16 October 2025. Distilled Magazine.
152

52

other ratepayers156. It’s scenarios like these, the introduction of major power consumers,
that present challenges to areas with already stressed electrical infrastructure, like Ithaca
and Tompkins County, raising both technical and ethical questions over who should pay
and whose service will be prioritized.
Beyond the cost of necessary upgrades, the natural monopoly created by the utility
industry and public policy also confines consumers to limited choice and often higher
cost. Over the past several years, Tompkins County and other central New York residents
have expressed growing frustration with ongoing billing errors, declining customer service,
and increasing delivery rates. Multiple media outlets have covered both the frustration and
the subsequent third-party audit ordered by the Public Service Commission157,158,159. While
sole company ownership over transmission and distribution infrastructure can keep costs
low by eliminating redundancies and increasing efficiencies and oversight, they offer few, if
any, other options for ratepayers when frustration grows high enough to seek alternatives.
Further, with fewer options available, customers are less likely to participate in the
democratic process and structures that are built to protect ratepayers from exorbitant rate
hikes, unnecessary tariffs, or bills issues.
Flexibility
A major drawback of centralized power is its low flexibility and lack of resilience. As both
demand and energy input to the grid evolve and weather patterns change, centralized
infrastructure is not designed to manage load variability and result in unreliable electrical
service160. As cities like Ithaca continue to deploy renewable energy systems with grid
interconnections, we are forced to grapple with the challenges associated with the innate
intermittency of source generation, like the availability of solar or wind energy, and the
common variability of temperature spikes, particularly in peak seasons. Transmission
congestion of this nature impacts both the transmission system as a whole and individual
end-users. For example, in high temperatures or in periods of high-demand, transmission
lines can swell and sag beyond their usual range, damaging the infrastructure
permanently161. In turn, additional investments in grid infrastructure are needed to both

Hawkins, D. Construction on Meta’s largest data center brings 600% crash spike, chaos to rural Louisiana.
2022 November 2025. Louisiana Illuminator.
157
Dougherty, M. Josh Riley Launches Investigation into NYSEG Over Rate Hikes and Transparency
Complaints. 17 April 2025. Ithaca Times.
158
Rovenolt, M. NYSEG: Addressing shortfalls and customer complaints. 15 March 2023. Tompkins Weekly.
159
Vogel, M. Audit of NYSEG Finds Billing Issues, Leadership Conflicts. 12 June 2025. Ithaca Times.
160
Kabir, E., et al. Quantifying the impact of multi-scale climate variability on electricity prices in a renewabledominated power grid (2024). Renewable Energy. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2024.120013
161
Joint Economic Committee. How Renewable Energy Can Make the Power Grid More Reliable and Address
RIsks to Electricity Infrastructure (2024). U.S. Senate.
156

53

repair and reinforce transmission wires, raising costs for ratepayers. Further, when peak
load variability extremes occur, like a very sunny, hot day, utility companies can practice
service curtailment, which is the intentional reduction of power in an attempt to balance
the grid. On the opposite end of the spectrum, when energy supply is overproduced and
causes congestion, this can cause power surges, or sudden spikes in electrical voltage.
Surges can permanently damage anything that is grid-tied, including home appliances,
further raising costs for customers. There are load management solutions that can help
with this variability and allow for the rapid deployment of renewables 162,163. Many of these
solutions are included in the Recommendations section of this Climate Action Plan.
Resilience
Electrical Grid Outages
The following assessment is borrowed from the Tompkins County report Navigating
Electrical Outages: Proactive Steps for Today and Tomorrow’s Electrified World. The City of
Ithaca thanks the County’s Planning & Sustainability Office for their hard work in producing
the report and for their permission to reproduce it here. The section from the County’s
report is included in full. Table and chart numbers and references have been updated for
this document. Readers can find the original report here.
The NYS Public Service Commission is increasingly focused on investing in strengthening
the resiliency of the electricity grid. At the local level, understanding the frequency,
duration, and causes of electrical outages is crucial for anticipating potential future
outages. To this end, outage data provided by the electric utility, New York State Electric
and Gas (NYSEG) for the last three years in Tompkins County is presented above.
Table 1 shows the number of electrical outages in Tompkins County from 2020 to 2023.
NYSEG tracks the causes for each outage. Those detailed descriptions were grouped into
six categories: vegetation interference, equipment failure, animal interference,
maintenance, weather, and miscellaneous. It is clear the largest number of outages arise
from vegetative interference, such as a tree or branch falling on a transmission line.
Equipment failures account for 25.5% of all outages and could include anything from
defective switch to transformer damage. The Miscellaneous category includes outages

https://www.jec.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/democrats/2024/1/how-renewable-energy-can-make-thepower-grid-more-reliable-and-address-risks-to-electricity-infrastructure
162
Martin, L. and Brehm, K. Clean Energy 101: Virtual Power Plants (2023). Rocky Mountain Institute.
https://rmi.org/clean-energy-101-virtual-power-plants/
163
Siegner, K., et al. Cheaper, Cleaner, Faster (2023). Rocky Mountain Institute. https://rmi.org/cheapercleaner-faster/

54

caused by installation of cable lines, adding new customer loads, or loss of supply 164 . The
outages totaled 2,236 over the 1,095 days (three years) in the data set reviewed. This
averages at two outages per day in Tompkins County over the last three years.
Table 1: Number of Electrical Outages in Tompkins County by Cause from 2020-2023
Cause of Outage
Number of Outages
Percent of Outages by Cause
Vegetation Interference
1,210
54.11%
Equipment Failure
571
25.54%
Animal Interference
156
6.98%
Maintenance
129
5.77%
Weather
104
4.65%
Miscellaneous
66
2.95%
Total Number of Outages
2,236

Beyond the number of outages, another important consideration is the duration of those
outages. Table 2 shows the Outage Duration Statistics for Tompkins County from 2020 to
2023. The minimum outage in Tompkins County was ten minutes, with the longest outage
lasting fourteen hours and forty-three minutes. The average outage duration was 3 hours
and 20 minutes. Understanding the duration of outages will help tailor short-term or longterm solutions for grid outages.
Table 2: Outage Duration Statistics in Tompkins County
Minimum
Average
Maximum

Hours
0.17
3.33
14.71

Grid Vulnerabilities & Strengths
As electrification is increasingly adopted in New York State, the State and utility partners
are implementing steps to address electric grid vulnerabilities and strengths to reduce the
likelihood of outages. This section outlines some of the major issues being studied and
addressed by those partners.
Tompkins County and other Upstate New York communities may be somewhat better
insulated from future brownouts due to their relatively lower electric load compared to
Downstate areas. Additionally, the Upstate grid’s large amount of hydroelectric power
lends some stability to the electric supply in Upstate New York165. However, the
NYSEG provided all the outage data, which is publicly available. For each of the following combination:
incident number + date + circuit, the entry is unique with only the longest outage being counted.
165
New York Independent Systems Operator (NYISO). Real Time Data Dashboard: Real-Time Fuel Mix and
Load with Losses. https://www.nyiso.com/real-time-dashboard
164

55

intermittent nature of wind and solar energy, which supplement hydroelectric power as the
grid moves towards more renewable energy sources, presents challenges. Solar
generation peaks during the day and during the summer, and declines before evening
loads rise, while wind generation is greater at night when demand is typically lower. In the
winter, there is generally lower solar generation from limited daylight, which must be
considered as cold weather impacts EV battery consumption and capacity and demands
for electrified building heating systems increase. Understanding these nuances and how to
manage generation versus demand will be key to reducing stress on the grid as
electrification grows.
Climate change and the strengthening of storms and extreme temperatures can also
further exacerbate grid vulnerabilities. Renewable energy power shortages are likely to
arise if there are co-occurring high temperatures with wind or water droughts in the
summer or lower temperatures with wind droughts in the winter166 . Similarly, higher
temperatures lead to higher energy demands for cooling, which strains the grid. This is
more likely as the planet’s temperature is expected to rise. Similarly, severe storms or
increased instances of drought can impact infrastructure that’s already running at
capacity. In an electrified future, the amount of electric energy needed will increase
because the transportation and building sectors will increasingly be requiring electricity to
power vehicles and heating loads. The change in electric energy demand will result in New
York State transitioning from a summer-peaking to a winter-peaking region. This introduces
additional challenges for a future where electrification is standard. Peaking is the time
when the electric grid has the highest electricity demand systemwide, and it introduces
vulnerabilities to outages if supply cannot keep pace with demand. Current summerpeaking typically occurs on high-temperature days when demand for cooling is highest. As
building HVAC systems move from fossil fuel to heat pumps, the resulting increase in
electricity usage for heating is expected to reconfigure the system so that the highest
electricity demand occurs in winter months during the coldest hours of the year. This is a
concern as the risks for loss of heat in the winter are significant.
As the grid becomes increasingly “smart,” it also provides more openings for bad actors to
access the system and thus becomes more susceptible to cyber attacks. Cyber attacks to
the grid could disrupt service and cause outages. The Department of Energy’s Office of
Cybersecurity, Energy Security, and Emergency Response (CESER) has seen significant

Liu, M. V., Cornell University Systems Engineering Department. “Heterogeneous Vulnerability of Zero-Carbon
Power Grids Under Climate-Technological Changes.” Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, December 16, 2024.
https://arxiv.org/pdf/2307.15079.
166

56

investments from the federal government to help reduce cyber risks and strengthen the
resilience of the grid167 .

Office of Cybersecurity, Energy Security, and Emergency Response (CESER). ”DOE Announces $45 Million to
Protect Americans From Cyber Threats and Improve Cybersecurity in America's Energy Sector”. U.S. Department of
Energy. February 26, 2024. https://www.energy.gov/articles/doe-announces-45-million-protect-americans-cyberthreats-and-improve-cybersecurity
167

57

Climate Action Plan Recommendations Matrix
N0.

Recommendation

Page #

Housing

Labor

Public
Health

Equity

Emergency
Response

Power
Reliability

GHG Reduction

Resilience

Project Start
Timeline

Projected
Cost to City

Housing
1

Promote Density & Infill Housing
2 Participatory Housing Process
3 Home Energy Score Ordinance
4 Transportation Access Minimums
5 Portable Heat Pump Pilot
6 Small-Scale Solar & Batteries
7 Flood Resilient Landscaping & Surfaces
8 Rent Stabilization
9 Commercial Building Performance Standards
10 Local NFIP Subsidies












































Labor























Short
Short
Medium
Medium
Medium
Long
Short
Short
Short
Long

$
$
$
$
$$
$$
$
$
$$$
$$$

Ban the Box
Acclimatization & Rest Requirements
3 Adopt Just Cause Employment
4 Mobile Rehabilitation & Command Vehicles
5 Reskilling & Upskilling Training
6 Invest in Bus Networks
7 Support Workforce Development Programs
8 Assist with Securing a Downtown Training Center
9 Adopt a Local Living Wage








































Public Health





















Short
Medium
Short
Long
Medium
Long
Short
Short
Short

$
$
$
$$$
$$
$$
$$
$
$

Air Quality Monitoring Dashboard
Identify Active Transportation Corridors
3 Deploy Additional Cooling/Warming Centers
4 Maximum Temperature Ordinance
5 CDC BRACE Partnership
6 Support & Expand Induction Cooktop Program
7 Support & Expand City Forestry Program
8 Age-Friendly Community
9 Mobile Rehabilitation & Charging Vehicles
10 Employer Incentivized Micromobility
11 Vector Disease Campaigns
12 Waste Reduction




















































Racial Equity



























Medium
Long
Short
Medium
Short
Medium
Short
Short
Long
Medium
Short
Short

$$
$$
$$
$
$
$
$$
$
$$$
$
$
$

CJC Survey & Mapping
Position BIPOC Communities as Leaders
3 Balance Representation
4 Robust Community Engagement
5 Prioritize CJC for Investment
6 Support Transitional Employment
7 Identify Entrepreneurial Training Partner









































Short
Short
Short
Short
Short
Medium
Medium

$
$
$
$
$
$
$

1
2

1
2

1
2









Community-Wide Priority Survey
Develop an Equity Screening Tool
10 Join Resilient Cities Network
11 Develop a Racial Equity Action Plan
12 Routinely Reassess Policies & Procedures



















Hire an Emergency Manager
Develop General Evacuation Plans
3 Identify & Invest In Responder Equipment Needs
Develop Vulnerable Population Evacuation &
4
Response Plan
5 Invest in Senior Leadership Training
6 Deploy Community Resilience Training
7 Develop Extreme Heat & AQ Plan
8 Create a Resilience Committee
9 Pursue Emergency Management Accreditation
10 Invest in Green Infrastructure
11 Identify Resilience Hubs
12 Deploy EV Charging Along Evacuation Routes
13 Identify Emergency Medical Response Plan
14 Identify Telecommunications Gaps


























































Decentralize Power Generation
Rate Case Participation
3 Heat Pump Rate Advocacy
4 Aggressive Deployment of DERs
5 Parking Lot Solar Ordinance
6 Load Control Through VPPs
7 Pursue Autonomous Microgrid(s)
8 End-of-Life Equipment Ordinance
9 Deployment of Weatherization Teams
10 Benchmarking & Performance Standards
11 Aggregate Rooftop Solar Contracts
12 Strategic Charging & Generation Hubs








































8
9

1
2

1
2







Medium
Short
Short
Medium
Short

$
$
$
$
$









Short
Short
Medium

$$
$
$$






































Emergency Response











Power Reliability













$












Short
Medium
Long
Medium
Short
Long
Long
Medium
Long
Short
Short

$$
$
$
$
$
$$$
$
$
$
$














Long
Short
Short
Long
Short
Long
Long
Medium
Medium
Medium
Long
Long

$
$$
$
$$$
$
$$$
$$$
$
$
$
$
$$$