Heat pump vs. gas furnace in Greenville, TX
This one's marginal in Greenville: it only clears if you stay long enough. $3,500 is what Greenville would pay extra to go electric rather than replace the furnace and AC with the same again, once the $2,000 federal credit is applied. Greenville's residents would see roughly $294 a year back in running costs, putting the payback around 11.9 years. Whether that's worth it in Greenville depends on how many years you expect to own the place.
The climate behind Greenville's payback figure
Greenville has a mild winter by US standards — 2066 heating degree days a year against a 65°F base — and summers are hot enough that cooling matters as much as heating, at 2217 cooling degree days. Sizing runs off the design temperature, not the average day: 12.2°F here (record low 9.3°F), which works out to a seasonal COP of 2.99 for the cold-climate class of unit this climate calls for. Greenville 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, MAJORS AIRPORT, 4 miles from Greenville.
What it actually costs to run, year to year
A 2000-square-foot house here would pull roughly 1,750 heating kilowatt-hours annually on top of cooling, totalling about $588 a year on electricity. The gas furnace it replaces burns roughly 22 Mcf a year at 19.42 per Mcf here, for a running cost near $882 a year (electricity here runs 16.15¢/kWh). Buy it outright, not incrementally, and payback stretches to 45.9 years; over 15 years the net position sits $911 ahead.
If your home heats with electric baseboard instead of gas
Gas isn't universal in Greenville — many houses run on electric heat already. Swap the comparison to resistance heat instead of gas, and Greenville's answer improves. Switching saves about $721 a year here — a heat pump moving heat rather than generating it needs far less electricity than resistance coils — so the extra $8,000 spent up front comes back in about 11.1 years.
Greenville against the rest of the country
Greenville lands at position 2415 out of 3206 cities on heating severity (coldest is 1), and 1200 out of 3206 by population size (biggest is 1). That's the mildest third of cities covered, where utility rates carry more of the answer than climate does.
Deciding what's next in Greenville, TX
About 34,355 people live in Greenville, Texas, and every number on this page is what a contractor would actually work from when quoting a system here — the point isn't to replace that quote, it's to tell you whether to bother asking for one. Here, there's no cost penalty to waiting until your current furnace or AC actually needs replacing.
Ask a local HVAC contractor for a quote before committing either way.
Reading further on this page's numbers
Nothing above is a black box: the methodology guide shows the full arithmetic behind Greenville's 2.99 seasonal COP and payback figure. At a 12.2°F design temperature, Greenville sits in cold-climate territory; the guide to that class of unit explains why.