It's mostly centered around cost. Fuel (of all types) is so cheap in the US that efficiency was not an ultra high priority for most people. Ironically, the US has now gotten extremely competent at drilling for natural gas and the price is going to stay pretty much fixed where it is for the next 50+ years. Most of the waste from the early days has also been reduced and funneled into new petrochemical production processes that used to be reliant on oil.
If you are going to stay in one place for a long time, renewable solutions to problems like hot water and residential electricity are worth the investment, but with the migratory nature of the US worker, it's often cheaper for a household to pay for fuel for 5~ years rather than invest in a renewable solution that they will never reap the monetary benefits from.
From what I've experienced since moving from the US to Europe in 2022, it's a lot more common for people to stay in the same houses for an extended period of time. Especially here where I live in the Netherlands, you can commute to work almost anywhere in the country in about 2 hours by car. This allows people to keep the family home.
If you are going to stay in one place for a long time, renewable solutions to problems like hot water and residential electricity are worth the investment, but with the migratory nature of the US worker, it's often cheaper for a household to pay for fuel for 5~ years rather than invest in a renewable solution that they will never reap the monetary benefits from.
From what I've experienced since moving from the US to Europe in 2022, it's a lot more common for people to stay in the same houses for an extended period of time. Especially here where I live in the Netherlands, you can commute to work almost anywhere in the country in about 2 hours by car. This allows people to keep the family home.