Heat Pump Payback in Hazelwood, MO
Is a heat pump worth it in Hazelwood?
Hazelwood technically pencils out, but only past the point the equipment would need replacing anyway. Swap a failed furnace and AC for a heat pump rather than buying like-for-like, and the extra cost here runs $5,500. That premium is recovered through $242 of lower running costs every year, landing the payback clock at roughly 22.8 years. Hazelwood's own numbers say this pencils out only in theory, not in practice.
Compare against another city
Hazelwood is one of 3206 cities covered here, each run through the same model. Search another below.
The climate behind Hazelwood's payback figure
Hazelwood has a real but manageable winter, 3396 heating degree days a year against a 65°F base, and summers are hot enough that cooling matters as much as heating, at 2013 cooling degree days. Sizing runs off the design temperature, not the average day: 1.9°F here (coldest 2024 reading -7.1°F), which works out to a seasonal COP of 2.75 for the cold-climate class of unit this climate calls for. Below the 25°F line where a standard machine starts leaning on resistance backup, Hazelwood sits firmly in cold-climate territory, so that's the class of unit priced here. These numbers come from Lambert-St Louis Internationa, the closest NOAA station, 3.1 miles out.
Hazelwood's running-cost comparison, in dollars
Modelled on a typical 2000-square-foot house, the heat pump draws about 3,127 kWh a year to keep it warm, plus cooling, for a combined electric bill near $621 a year. The gas furnace it replaces burns roughly 35 Mcf a year at $14.94 per Mcf here, for a running cost near $863 a year including the old AC (electricity here runs 12.83¢/kWh). If the current system still worked and you replaced it anyway, the full cost would take longer than the 15-year equipment life to earn back; against buying a new furnace and AC regardless, the 15-year total lands $1,874 behind.
How sensitive Hazelwood's result is to prices
This result holds unless electricity climbs above 23.6¢/kWh (it is 12.83¢ now) or gas drops below $8.11 per Mcf (now $14.94); past either point, gas becomes the cheaper fuel in Hazelwood. When quotes arrive, compare the heat pump price with a like-for-like furnace and AC replacement: at $242 a year saved, a difference under $1,694 pays back within 7 years here, and under $2,420 within 10.
The other scenario: no gas furnace to begin with
Not every home in Hazelwood has gas service. Against electric-resistance heat, baseboard or an electric furnace, both 100% efficient but still just resistance, the case for switching gets stronger here. About $817 a year comes back this way, enough that the 12.2-year payback clears the $10,000 premium comfortably within the equipment's life.
Where Hazelwood ranks in this dataset
Hazelwood lands at position 1798 out of 3206 cities on heating severity (coldest is 1), and 1609 out of 3206 by population size (biggest is 1). That's the middle third for winter severity among the cities covered here.
Deciding what's next in Hazelwood, MO
About 24,951 people live in Hazelwood, Missouri, 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.
Get quotes from local HVAC contractors before deciding.
Reading further on this page's numbers
Nothing above is a black box: the methodology guide shows the full arithmetic behind Hazelwood's 2.75 seasonal COP and payback figure. Hazelwood's 1.9°F design temperature falls on the cold side of the 25°F cutoff the cold-climate unit guide walks through.