Heat pump vs. gas furnace in Siloam Springs, AR
This one's marginal in Siloam Springs: it only clears if you stay long enough. $3,500 is what Siloam Springs 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. Lower bills claw that back: about $326 saved annually, for a payback of roughly 10.7 years. Whether that's worth it in Siloam Springs depends on how many years you expect to own the place.
The climate behind Siloam Springs's payback figure
2866 heating degree days pile up here every year, so Siloam Springs has a mild winter by US standards; the cooling side runs to 1728 cooling degree days, where summers are hot enough that cooling matters as much as heating. The 99% winter design temperature here — the cold snap equipment must be sized for, not the seasonal average — is 1.9°F, against a record low of -6°F. That puts the seasonal coefficient of performance at 2.75 for the recommended cold-climate unit. A cold-climate unit is the right call in Siloam Springs — below 25°F design temperature, a standard heat pump leans hard on electric-resistance backup, which erases most of the savings. Climate figures trace to the nearest NOAA station, SMITH FIELD AIRPORT, 2.2 miles from Siloam Springs.
What it actually costs to run, year to year
Modelled on a typical 2000-square-foot house, the heat pump draws about 2,639 kWh a year to keep it warm, plus cooling, for a combined electric bill near $546 a year. Siloam Springs's gas rate of 19.25 per Mcf, applied to the 30 Mcf a year the furnace burns, puts its running cost near $872 a year, against 13.28¢ per kWh for electricity. Looked at as a full purchase rather than an incremental one, payback here is roughly 41.4 years, leaving the 15-year total $1,388 ahead.
Electric resistance heat in Siloam Springs, compared
Plenty of homes in Siloam Springs heat with electricity alone, no gas line involved. Swap the comparison to resistance heat instead of gas, and Siloam Springs's answer improves. About $715 a year comes back this way, enough that the 11.2-year payback clears the $8,000 premium comfortably within the equipment's life.
Where Siloam Springs ranks in this dataset
Siloam Springs lands at position 1960 out of 3206 cities on heating severity (coldest is 1), and 1918 out of 3206 by population size (biggest is 1). That's the middle third for winter severity among the cities covered here.
Next step for 20,075 people in Siloam Springs
About 20,075 people live in Siloam Springs, Arkansas, 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.
Line up a few local HVAC quotes before you decide.
Reading further on this page's numbers
The methodology guide walks through exactly how Siloam Springs's 2.75 seasonal COP and the rest of this page's numbers get built. Siloam Springs's 1.9°F design temperature falls on the cold side of the 25°F cutoff the cold-climate unit guide walks through.