Heat Pump Payback in Farmington, UT
Is a heat pump worth it in Farmington?
In Farmington, the extra upfront cost technically comes back, just not before the equipment wears out. Against a like-for-like gas furnace and AC swap, going electric costs $5,500 more up front here. Lower bills claw that back: about $53 saved annually, for a payback of roughly 103.8 years. That's a technicality, not a recommendation, for anyone actually living in Farmington.
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Farmington's weather, in the numbers that matter
Degree days tell the story here: Farmington racks up 5273 heating degree days each year (base 65°F), and summers are hot enough that cooling matters as much as heating, with 1329 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 12.4°F, and the coldest daily reading in the 2024 station record was 9°F. That puts the seasonal coefficient of performance at 3 for the recommended cold-climate unit. Farmington 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. Climate figures trace to the nearest NOAA station, Hill AFB Airport, 9.7 miles from Farmington.
Farmington's running-cost comparison, in dollars
Electricity use for heating alone comes out to about 4,451 kWh a year on the 2000-square-foot reference house; folding in cooling puts the electric bill near $733 a year. That compares with roughly 55 Mcf a year of gas at Farmington's $10.19 per-Mcf rate, about $786 a year with the old AC included, against a local electricity rate of 13.12¢/kWh. Buying outright rather than at replacement time stretches payback to longer than the 15-year equipment life. Over 15 years, compared with a like-for-like replacement, the heat pump leaves you $4,705 behind.
What would change Farmington's answer
Gas would only overtake the heat pump in Farmington if electricity rose past 14.5¢/kWh from 13.12¢, or gas fell under $9.23 per Mcf from $10.19. A useful quote test for Farmington: the heat pump is worth it within a decade if it costs less than $530 more than replacing the furnace and AC, and within 7 years if the gap is under $371.
If your home heats with electric baseboard instead of gas
Gas isn't universal in Farmington, many houses run on electric heat already. Compared with baseboard or electric-furnace resistance heat, the numbers shift in the heat pump’s favor. The saving here runs about $1,245 a year, which recovers the extra $10,000 spent going electric in roughly 8 years.
How Farmington compares nationally
Among 3206 cities, Farmington's winter puts it at rank 530 for severity, while its size puts it at rank 1531 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.
What to do with this number in Farmington
Farmington, Utah is home to about 26,163 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 Farmington, nothing is lost by holding off until the current equipment genuinely fails.
Get quotes from local HVAC contractors before deciding.
Where Farmington's figure comes from
Nothing above is a black box: the methodology guide shows the full arithmetic behind Farmington's 3 seasonal COP and payback figure. At a 12.4°F design temperature, Farmington sits in cold-climate territory; the guide to that class of unit explains why.