Should Huntington switch to a heat pump?
Huntington technically pencils out, but only past the point the equipment would need replacing anyway. Against a like-for-like gas furnace and AC swap, going electric costs $3,500 more up front here (already netting out a $2,000 tax credit). That premium is recovered through $148 of lower running costs every year, landing the payback clock at roughly 23.7 years. Huntington's own numbers say this pencils out only in theory, not in practice.
Why Huntington's climate drives this number
Huntington has a real but manageable winter — 3422 heating degree days a year against a 65°F base — and summers are hot enough that cooling matters as much as heating, at 1588 cooling degree days. Sizing runs off the design temperature, not the average day: 10.4°F here (record low 6.1°F), which works out to a seasonal COP of 2.95 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, Huntington sits firmly in cold-climate territory, so that's the class of unit priced here. Climate figures trace to the nearest NOAA station, TRI-STATE/M.J.FERGUS, 7.2 miles from Huntington.
What it actually costs to run, year to year
Electricity use for heating alone comes out to about 2,937 kWh a year on the 2000-square-foot reference house; folding in cooling puts the electric bill near $661 a year. The gas furnace it replaces burns roughly 36 Mcf a year at 13.80 per Mcf here, for a running cost near $809 a year (electricity here runs 15.41¢/kWh). Priced as a standalone purchase rather than against a like-for-like replacement, equipment payback runs about 91.4 years, for a 15-year net position $1,285 behind.
Electric resistance heat in Huntington, compared
Gas isn't universal in Huntington — many houses run on electric heat already. Swap the comparison to resistance heat instead of gas, and Huntington's answer improves. The saving here runs about $991 a year, which recovers the extra $8,000 spent going electric in roughly 8.1 years.
Huntington against the rest of the country
Ranked against the other 3206 cities covered, Huntington comes in at 1789 for heating severity — 1 would be the coldest place in the dataset — and 916 by population, where 1 is largest. That's the middle third for winter severity among the cities covered here.
Next step for 44,942 people in Huntington
About 44,942 people live in Huntington, West Virginia, 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
Every constant behind this page — the 2.95 seasonal COP, the degree-day corrections, the equipment costs — is documented in the methodology guide. At a 10.4°F design temperature, Huntington sits in cold-climate territory; the guide to that class of unit explains why.