Heat Pump Payback in Clinton, UT
Is a heat pump worth it in Clinton?
In Clinton, the extra upfront cost technically comes back, just not before the equipment wears out. $5,500 is what Clinton would pay extra to go electric rather than replace the furnace and AC with the same again. Clinton's residents would see roughly $69 a year back in running costs, putting the payback around 79.4 years. That's a technicality, not a recommendation, for anyone actually living in Clinton.
Not the city you meant?
This runs the same numbers for 3206 US cities, not just Clinton. Look one up here.
How cold Clinton actually gets
Degree days tell the story here: Clinton racks up 4722 heating degree days each year (base 65°F), and summers are hot enough that cooling matters as much as heating, with 1811 cooling degree days on the cooling side. The 99% winter design temperature here, the cold snap equipment must be sized for, not the seasonal average, is 9°F, and the coldest daily reading in the 2024 station record was 6.1°F. That puts the seasonal coefficient of performance at 2.92 for the recommended cold-climate unit. Clinton needs the cold-climate class of unit: past a 25°F design temperature a standard heat pump falls back on resistance backup often enough to eat the savings. Source: NOAA station Ogden-Hinckley Airport, 4.9 miles from Clinton, the closest one on record.
The yearly running costs in Clinton
Modelled on a typical 2000-square-foot house, the heat pump draws about 4,095 kWh a year to keep it warm, plus cooling, for a combined electric bill near $740 a year. The gas furnace it replaces burns roughly 49 Mcf a year at $10.19 per Mcf here, for a running cost near $809 a year including the old AC (electricity here runs 13.12¢/kWh). Priced as a standalone purchase, with a working furnace ripped out early, payback would take longer than the 15-year equipment life. Measured against the like-for-like replacement instead, a household here ends 15 years $4,461 behind.
How sensitive Clinton's result is to prices
Gas would only overtake the heat pump in Clinton if electricity rose past 15.2¢/kWh from 13.12¢, or gas fell under $8.78 per Mcf from $10.19. A useful quote test for Clinton: the heat pump is worth it within a decade if it costs less than $690 more than replacing the furnace and AC, and within 7 years if the gap is under $483.
Electric resistance heat in Clinton, compared
Gas isn't universal in Clinton, many houses run on electric heat already. Against electric-resistance heat, baseboard or an electric furnace, both 100% efficient but still just resistance, the case for switching gets stronger here. Switching saves about $1,137 a year here, a heat pump moving heat rather than generating it needs far less electricity than resistance coils, so the extra $10,000 spent up front comes back in about 8.8 years.
Clinton against the rest of the country
Among 3206 cities, Clinton's winter puts it at rank 1008 for severity, while its size puts it at rank 1672 for population, 1 in both cases being the extreme. That's the coldest third of the dataset, where climate does most of the work behind this figure.
Next step if you live in Clinton
Clinton, Utah is home to about 23,728 people, and the figures above are the same ones a local HVAC contractor uses to size and quote a system, this site doesn't guess where a real quote would land, it just tells you whether it's worth asking for one. In Clinton, nothing is lost by holding off until the current equipment genuinely fails.
Get quotes from local HVAC contractors before deciding.
More on how this number was built
Nothing above is a black box: the methodology guide shows the full arithmetic behind Clinton's 2.92 seasonal COP and payback figure. Clinton's 9°F design temperature is below the 25°F line, which is why a cold-climate unit is the right call here, see what that changes in the cold-climate unit guide.