Temple, TX: the heat pump payback math
In Temple, the math is close enough that it comes down to how long you plan to stay. $3,500 is what Temple 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 $329 saved annually, for a payback of roughly 10.6 years. Whether that's worth it in Temple depends on how many years you expect to own the place.
The climate behind Temple's payback figure
Degree days tell the story here: Temple racks up 1528 heating degree days each year (base 65°F), and summers are severe enough that cooling can dominate the annual bill, with 3080 cooling degree days on the cooling side. Sizing runs off the design temperature, not the average day: 17.1°F here (record low 12.9°F), which works out to a seasonal COP of 3.11 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, Temple sits firmly in cold-climate territory, so that's the class of unit priced here. Source: NOAA station DRAUGHON-MILLER CNTRL TX RGNL, 3.5 miles from Temple — the closest one on record.
What it actually costs to run, year to year
Electricity use for heating alone comes out to about 1,244 kWh a year on the 2000-square-foot reference house; folding in cooling puts the electric bill near $625 a year. That compares with roughly 16 Mcf a year of gas at Temple's 19.42 per-Mcf rate — about $954 a year — against a local electricity rate of 16.15¢/kWh. Buy it outright, not incrementally, and payback stretches to 41.1 years; over 15 years the net position sits $1,430 ahead.
If your home heats with electric baseboard instead of gas
Plenty of homes in Temple 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 $644 a year, which recovers the extra $8,000 spent going electric in roughly 12.4 years.
Where Temple ranks in this dataset
Temple lands at position 2677 out of 3206 cities on heating severity (coldest is 1), and 357 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.
Next step for 96,267 people in Temple
About 96,267 people live in Temple, Texas, 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.
Get quotes from local HVAC contractors before deciding.
Reading further on this page's numbers
Nothing above is a black box: the methodology guide shows the full arithmetic behind Temple's 3.11 seasonal COP and payback figure. Temple's 17.1°F design temperature falls on the cold side of the 25°F cutoff the cold-climate unit guide walks through.