Heat pump vs. gas furnace in Laurel, MD

Laurel 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). Laurel's residents would see roughly $45 a year back in running costs, putting the payback around 78.6 years. That's a technicality, not a recommendation, for anyone actually living in Laurel.

Laurel's weather, in the numbers that matter

Degree days tell the story here: Laurel racks up 4347 heating degree days each year (base 65°F), and summers add a moderate cooling load, with 989 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 12.2°F, against a record low of 6.8°F. That puts the seasonal coefficient of performance at 2.99 for the recommended cold-climate unit. Below the 25°F line where a standard machine starts leaning on resistance backup, Laurel sits firmly in cold-climate territory, so that's the class of unit priced here. Source: NOAA station TIPTON, 5.5 miles from Laurel — the closest one on record.

Laurel's running-cost comparison, in dollars

Electricity use for heating alone comes out to about 3,681 kWh a year on the 2000-square-foot reference house; folding in cooling puts the electric bill near $957 a year. The gas furnace it replaces burns roughly 45 Mcf a year at 16.14 per Mcf here, for a running cost near $1,002 a year (electricity here runs 21.16¢/kWh). Looked at as a full purchase rather than an incremental one, payback here is roughly 303.3 years, leaving the 15-year total $2,832 behind.

If your home heats with electric baseboard instead of gas

Plenty of homes in Laurel heat with electricity alone, no gas line involved. Swap the comparison to resistance heat instead of gas, and Laurel's answer improves. The saving here runs about $1,643 a year, which recovers the extra $8,000 spent going electric in roughly 4.9 years.

Laurel against the rest of the country

Laurel lands at position 1283 out of 3206 cities on heating severity (coldest is 1), and 1347 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 Laurel, MD

Laurel, Maryland is home to about 30,238 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 Laurel, nothing is lost by holding off until the current equipment genuinely fails.

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 2.99 seasonal COP, the degree-day corrections, the equipment costs — is documented in the methodology guide. Laurel's 12.2°F design temperature falls on the cold side of the 25°F cutoff the cold-climate unit guide walks through.