Demand-side management in the Western Energy Imbalance Market: Efficiency without equity?

Rising electricity demand in the Western United States has increased reliance on demand-side management (DSM) to maintain reliability and reduce carbon emissions. Yet DSM programs have historically been designed around economic efficiency rather than equity. This paper presents the first systematic mapping of DSM strategies across the 32 distribution utilities participating in the Western Energy Imbalance Market (WEIM), integrating a coded database of over 500 utility programs with state policy analysis and spatial mapping. We examine how DSM strategies vary by utility type, policy alignment, and geography, and assess these patterns through an energy justice framework. The results reveal a deeply uneven DSM landscape: energy efficiency (EE) and distributed generation (DG) dominate due to low utility cost and strong state policy support, while demand response, dynamic pricing, education, and low-income (LI) programs remain sparse and inaccessible. IOUs provide the majority of DSM offerings; however, these often reproduce structural inequities by privileging homeowners with capital and excluding renters, low-income households, and non-English-speaking customers. State policies overwhelmingly support DG and EE but rarely mandate equitable and accessible DSM design. This analysis demonstrates that the DSM in the WEIM is primarily governed by efficiency logic rather than justice-oriented goals. Achieving equitable regional energy transitions will require stronger state mandates, expanded AMI and outreach support for smaller utilities, and DSM evaluation frameworks grounded in distributional, participatory, and recognition justice.