Pearl, MS: the heat pump payback math
In Pearl, the math is close enough that it comes down to how long you plan to stay. $3,500 is what Pearl 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. That premium is recovered through $272 of lower running costs every year, landing the payback clock at roughly 12.9 years. It's a genuine toss-up here — Pearl's numbers don't point clearly either way.
Pearl's weather, in the numbers that matter
1686 heating degree days pile up here every year, so Pearl has a mild winter by US standards; the cooling side runs to 2732 cooling degree days, where summers are severe enough that cooling can dominate the annual bill. The 99% winter design temperature here — the cold snap equipment must be sized for, not the seasonal average — is 20.1°F, against a record low of 10.9°F. That puts the seasonal coefficient of performance at 3.18 for the recommended cold-climate unit. Below the 25°F line where a standard machine starts leaning on resistance backup, Pearl sits firmly in cold-climate territory, so that's the class of unit priced here. Source: NOAA station JACKSON INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, 3.4 miles from Pearl — the closest one on record.
What it actually costs to run, year to year
Electricity use for heating alone comes out to about 1,343 kWh a year on the 2000-square-foot reference house; folding in cooling puts the electric bill near $568 a year. Pearl's gas rate of 16.64 per Mcf, applied to the 18 Mcf a year the furnace burns, puts its running cost near $840 a year, against 15.47¢ per kWh for electricity. Priced as a standalone purchase rather than against a like-for-like replacement, equipment payback runs about 49.7 years, for a 15-year net position $578 ahead.
The other scenario: no gas furnace to begin with
Plenty of homes in Pearl heat with electricity alone, no gas line involved. Against electric-resistance heat — baseboard or an electric furnace, both 100% efficient but still just resistance — the case for switching gets stronger here. The saving here runs about $640 a year, which recovers the extra $8,000 spent going electric in roughly 12.5 years.
How Pearl compares nationally
Pearl lands at position 2590 out of 3206 cities on heating severity (coldest is 1), and 1408 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.
What to do with this number in Pearl
Pearl, Mississippi is home to about 28,458 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 Pearl, nothing is lost by holding off until the current equipment genuinely fails.
Line up a few local HVAC quotes before you decide.
Reading further on this page's numbers
Every constant behind this page — the 3.18 seasonal COP, the degree-day corrections, the equipment costs — is documented in the methodology guide. At a 20.1°F design temperature, Pearl sits in cold-climate territory; the guide to that class of unit explains why.