Will a heat pump pay off in Shively, KY?
Shively technically pencils out, but only past the point the equipment would need replacing anyway. $3,500 is what Shively 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. Shively's residents would see roughly $192 a year back in running costs, putting the payback around 18.2 years. That's a technicality, not a recommendation, for anyone actually living in Shively.
Shively's weather, in the numbers that matter
3192 heating degree days pile up here every year, so Shively has a real but manageable winter; the cooling side runs to 1992 cooling degree days, where summers are hot enough that cooling matters as much as heating. Sizing runs off the design temperature, not the average day: 6.1°F here (record low 3°F), which works out to a seasonal COP of 2.85 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, Shively sits firmly in cold-climate territory, so that's the class of unit priced here. Source: NOAA station LOUISVILLE INTL-STANDIFORD FI, 4.3 miles from Shively — the closest one on record.
What it actually costs to run, year to year
A 2000-square-foot house here would pull roughly 2,836 heating kilowatt-hours annually on top of cooling, totalling about $653 a year on electricity. The gas furnace it replaces burns roughly 33 Mcf a year at 14.23 per Mcf here, for a running cost near $845 a year (electricity here runs 14.39¢/kWh). Priced as a standalone purchase rather than against a like-for-like replacement, equipment payback runs about 70.3 years, for a 15-year net position $619 behind.
The other scenario: no gas furnace to begin with
Plenty of homes in Shively heat with electricity alone, no gas line involved. Swap the comparison to resistance heat instead of gas, and Shively's answer improves. The saving here runs about $882 a year, which recovers the extra $8,000 spent going electric in roughly 9.1 years.
Shively against the rest of the country
Ranked against the other 3206 cities covered, Shively comes in at 1851 for heating severity — 1 would be the coldest place in the dataset — and 2312 by population, where 1 is largest. That's the middle third for winter severity among the cities covered here.
What to do with this number in Shively
Shively, Kentucky is home to about 15,850 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 Shively, nothing is lost by holding off until the current equipment genuinely fails.
Get quotes from local HVAC contractors before deciding.
Reading further on this page's numbers
Every constant behind this page — the 2.85 seasonal COP, the degree-day corrections, the equipment costs — is documented in the methodology guide. Shively's 6.1°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.