Lubbock, TX: the heat pump payback math
In Lubbock, the math is close enough that it comes down to how long you plan to stay. Swap a failed furnace and AC for a heat pump rather than buying like-for-like, and the extra cost here runs $3,500 after a $2,000 federal tax credit. Lower bills claw that back: about $360 saved annually, for a payback of roughly 9.7 years. It's a genuine toss-up here — Lubbock's numbers don't point clearly either way.
How cold Lubbock actually gets
Degree days tell the story here: Lubbock racks up 2668 heating degree days each year (base 65°F), and summers are hot enough that cooling matters as much as heating, with 2475 cooling degree days on the cooling side. Sizing runs off the design temperature, not the average day: 15.1°F here (record low 5°F), which works out to a seasonal COP of 3.06 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, Lubbock sits firmly in cold-climate territory, so that's the class of unit priced here. Climate figures trace to the nearest NOAA station, LUBBOCK INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, 8.1 miles from Lubbock.
The month-to-month numbers for Lubbock
Electricity use for heating alone comes out to about 2,208 kWh a year on the 2000-square-foot reference house; folding in cooling puts the electric bill near $697 a year. That compares with roughly 28 Mcf a year of gas at Lubbock's 19.42 per-Mcf rate — about $1,058 a year — against a local electricity rate of 16.15¢/kWh. Looked at as a full purchase rather than an incremental one, payback here is roughly 37.5 years, leaving the 15-year total $1,904 ahead.
The other scenario: no gas furnace to begin with
Plenty of homes in Lubbock heat with electricity alone, no gas line involved. Compared with baseboard or electric-furnace resistance heat, the numbers shift in the heat pump’s favor. About $912 a year comes back this way, enough that the 8.8-year payback clears the $8,000 premium comfortably within the equipment's life.
Where Lubbock ranks in this dataset
Among 3206 cities, Lubbock's winter puts it at rank 2056 for severity, while its size puts it at rank 84 for population — 1 in both cases being the extreme. That's the middle third for winter severity among the cities covered here.
Next step for 272,086 people in Lubbock
Lubbock, Texas is home to about 272,086 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 Lubbock, nothing is lost by holding off until the current equipment genuinely fails.
Get quotes from local HVAC contractors before deciding.
More on how this number was built
Every constant behind this page — the 3.06 seasonal COP, the degree-day corrections, the equipment costs — is documented in the methodology guide. Lubbock's 15.1°F design temperature is below the 25°F line, which is why a cold-climate unit is the right call here — see what that changes in the cold-climate unit guide.