Heat pump vs. gas furnace in Thibodaux, LA
Thibodaux clears a genuine payback here, inside a reasonable stretch of years. Swap a failed furnace and AC for a heat pump rather than buying like-for-like, and the extra cost here runs $1,000 after a $2,000 federal tax credit. Lower bills claw that back: about $267 saved annually, for a payback of roughly 3.7 years. That's a real payback, built from Thibodaux's own climate and utility rates, not a national guess.
The climate behind Thibodaux's payback figure
981 heating degree days pile up here every year, so Thibodaux barely has a winter to speak of; the cooling side runs to 3273 cooling degree days, where summers are severe enough that cooling can dominate the annual bill. Sizing runs off the design temperature, not the average day: 32°F here (record low 21.2°F), which works out to a seasonal COP of 3.15 for the standard class of unit this climate calls for. A standard ducted system is enough here; Thibodaux's design temperature doesn't justify the cold-climate premium. Source: NOAA station HOUMA-TERREBONNE AIRPORT, 18.3 miles from Thibodaux — the closest one on record.
What it actually costs to run, year to year
Electricity use for heating alone comes out to about 789 kWh a year on the 2000-square-foot reference house; folding in cooling puts the electric bill near $484 a year. The gas furnace it replaces burns roughly 10 Mcf a year at 17.38 per Mcf here, for a running cost near $751 a year (electricity here runs 13.52¢/kWh). Buy it outright, not incrementally, and payback stretches to 41.2 years; over 15 years the net position sits $3,007 ahead.
If your home heats with electric baseboard instead of gas
Not every home in Thibodaux has gas service. Swap the comparison to resistance heat instead of gas, and Thibodaux's answer improves. About $425 a year comes back this way, enough that the 12.9-year payback clears the $5,500 premium comfortably within the equipment's life.
Thibodaux against the rest of the country
Thibodaux lands at position 2913 out of 3206 cities on heating severity (coldest is 1), and 2338 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.
Deciding what's next in Thibodaux, LA
About 15,569 people live in Thibodaux, Louisiana, 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, it's worth getting quotes before your current system fails, not after.
Line up a few local HVAC quotes before you decide.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide walks through exactly how Thibodaux's 3.15 seasonal COP and the rest of this page's numbers get built. See what Thibodaux's figure looks like without the $2,000 federal credit in the guide to how that credit moves the payback window.