This table was received from the Canadian Urban Sustainability Practitioners (CUSP) network as part of a collaboration with the Community Data Program team.
The Household home energy expenditures dimension in this table includes separate counts for households with fuel but not electricity payments, households with electricity but not fuel payments, and households with electricity and fuel payments.
Please read the important note below regarding the home energy spending thresholds.
Note on data quality and disclosure control:
For information on data quality, as well as random rounding, data suppression, and other methods of disclosure control, please consult the Guide to the Census of Population, 2016, Catalogue no. 98-304-X, and the reference guides for the individual topics.
Click here to see a list of all CUSP data products available in the CDP catalogue.
High average values
After-tax income figures prominently in the indicators in these tables. Low after-tax incomes may not reflect the true level of household wealth in some areas and the high home energy burden calculated as a result may be misleading. A common situation where income taxes are larger than total income occurs when capital gains are realized. After-tax income does not include capital gains, such as RRSP withdrawals – however the taxes paid on capital gains are included in the calculation of after-tax income. An affluent senior, living off RRSP withdrawals in a large detached home could easily have a large home energy cost burden that does not reflect a true state of energy poverty.
Extremely low after-tax incomes can create extremely high values for home energy costs as a percentage of after-tax income. These extreme values can greatly skew the average, limiting its utility in favour of median home energy costs as a percentage of after-tax income.
Important note regarding the home energy spending thresholds
These tables contain a dimension that indicates the number of households paying more than a specific percentage of their income on home energy costs. The relevant dimension looks like this:
- Total - Percentage home energy spending
- Spending LT 3% on Fuel/Electricity
- Spending 3 to LT 6% on Fuel/Electricity
- Spending 6% + on Fuel/Electricity
- Spending 10% + on Fuel/Electricity
- Spending 15% + on Fuel/Electricity
(LT = less than)
The tables are actually using these cut-offs and not the values indicated above:
- Spending LT 2.54% on Fuel/Electricity
- Spending 2.54% to LT 5.54% on Fuel/Electricity
- Spending 5.54% + on Fuel/Electricity
- Spending 9.54% + on Fuel/Electricity
- Spending 14.54% + on Fuel/Electricity
These tables were originally designed for the 2016 Census. The production system available at the time had a random rounding methodology that could create significant distortions in the data. Using this convention with the “x.54%” thresholds reduced the distortion caused by random rounding. The old production system also had an issue where it would store certain fractions as whole numbers. Using the decimal method mitigated this issue.
For the 2021 Census, Statistics Canada switched to a production system that did not have these issues. However, to maintain comparability between the 2016 and 2021 data, the same methodology was used to produce the 2021 tables.
The CDP has received revised home energy tables for the 2021 Census. Those tables are available here. We will not be acquiring revised 2016 Census home energy tables.
Natural Resources Canada and Statistics Canada produced similar tables from the 2021 Census, but corrected the issue and used the correct percentage thresholds indicated above (3%, 6%, 10% and 15%). Details on these data can be found in this article:
Estimation of Energy Poverty Rates Using the 2021 Census of Population
It was through a comparison of the data in this article that the difference in methodology was discovered.
Note that the Natural Resources Canada data includes households on Indigenous reserves, which were excluded from the 2016 and 2021 CDP tables. Farm dwellings and households with 0 or negative after-tax income are excluded from both the CDP tables and the Natural Resources Canada tables.
The CDP has acquired data to match the same methodology as that used to produce the Natural Resources Canada tables. These tables are available in the file package and are marked “REVISED”.
The universe for these revised tables is: “Private households in non-farm dwellings, with after tax income greater than zero”.
Note that Private Households includes Dwellings provided by the local government, First Nation or Indian band, which were excluded from the universe of the original tables.
Please contact information@communitydata.ca if you have any questions.