Pennsylvania Heating

Heat pump vs furnace in Venango County, Pennsylvania

Get an Installer's Quote

Match with a pro in Venango County

Which costs less to run in Venango County?

An outdoor air conditioning condenser unit with a top-mounted fan grille sits on a concrete pad beside a dark horizontal-lap sided wall, with a disconnect box and refrigerant lines on the wall at night.

Heat pump

To heat your home here$2.37per 100,000 Btu

A beige residential furnace with two louvered access panels stands on a concrete floor against a dark blue painted block wall, with a metal flue duct, gas piping, and white PVC pipe above and beside it.

Furnace

To heat your home here$1.64per 100,000 Btu

At Pennsylvania's gas and electricity prices, a gas furnace makes the same heat as a heat pump for at least 30% less.

Btu stands for British thermal unit, the standard measure of heat energy.

Where does a heat pump shine?

  • No gas line, nothing burning in the house

    It moves heat instead of making it from fire. That means no combustion, no flue and no gas bill for heat.

    Kitchen with navy blue cabinets, white marble countertops, white subway tile backsplash, stainless steel range hood and kettle, a wooden bowl of green apples, a glass vase of white hydrangeas, and two wooden stools at the island.

  • Heats and cools in one system

    Winter and summer are covered by the same outdoor unit. That's one machine to service instead of two.

    A living room with a navy sofa, light blue cushions and a fringed throw in front of large white-framed windows showing a green garden, with a potted fiddle-leaf fig, an upholstered armchair, a woven rug, and a wooden coffee table holding a bowl, mug and vase of white flowers.

  • Steady, even comfort

    A heat pump runs long and low instead of blasting on and off. Rooms hold an even temperature all day.

    A dimly lit living room with dark blue built-in bookshelves, a navy armchair with a gray throw blanket and open book, a lit table lamp and mug on a wooden side table, a window seat with a blue cushion, and a golden-colored dog sleeping on a patterned rug.

Where does a furnace shine?

  • Runs on the gas most homes here already use

    Most homes in Venango County already run on utility gas, 67.7% of them. If yours is one, a gas furnace just ties into the line that's already there.

    A row of houses with blue-painted porches and front steps along a snow-edged sidewalk, with bare trees and a distant person walking away.

  • Pairs with any central AC

    The ductwork that delivers heat in winter delivers cool air in summer once an AC coil is added.

    A metal floor vent set into hardwood flooring beside a window with sheer white curtains, with sunlight and leaf shadows on the floor and a blue-and-cream patterned rug at right.

  • Fast, strong heat on demand

    The air coming from the vents feels genuinely hot. That's welcome on a freezing morning.

    An entryway with a dark blue door and snowy trees visible through its window, a pair of fur-lined winter boots on a jute rug, a wooden bench with a cushion, blue fringed throw and steaming mug, a wicker basket beneath, coats and a bag on wall hooks, a sheer curtain at right and a floor vent in the slate tile.

What winter here does to a heat pump

Winter is the long season here, not the short one. Heat runs about eight months a year, October through May, and cooling only runs July and August. Whatever you buy, you are buying it mostly to keep the house warm.

That matters because a standard heat pump loses ground exactly when you need it most. Below 40°F it puts out less heat than its rating says. Below about 35°F it usually needs backup heat to make up the difference. The average overnight low here in December, January and February is 20°F, under both marks. Of the roughly 245 nights the heat runs here, about 145 drop to freezing or below, and every one of those nights is also under both marks.

That does not mean the house goes cold. It means the heat pump is leaning on a backup heat source, usually electric resistance coils, for a large share of its coldest nights, and that backup heat costs more to run than the heat pump itself. A heat pump built to carry the ENERGY STAR Cold Climate label is tested to hold most of its capacity down to 5°F, so that label is worth checking for if you are looking at a heat pump here. A standard heat pump without it is not built for the stretch of winter this county actually has.

Only about 6 nights a year here reach 0°F or below. That is a small part of the 145 freezing nights, which tells you the real problem is ordinary freezing weather lasting for months, not a handful of extreme nights.

Snow-covered stone steps lead to a white storm door on a blue clapboard house, with a stacked woodpile, a snowy shrub, and a dry-stone wall alongside.

What it costs to run, and what the house is already set up for

Run the two machines on Pennsylvania's own fuel prices and the furnace wins. A gas furnace at the federal minimum efficiency makes 100,000 Btu of heat for $1.64. A heat pump at the federal minimum makes the same heat for $2.37. Gas is the cheaper fuel to heat with here, by at least 30 percent, and that gap holds even before counting what backup heat adds on the coldest nights.

The county's homes back this up. Utility gas already heats about two in three homes here, 67.7 percent. Electricity heats about one in ten, 10.1 percent, with propane also at about one in ten. A gas furnace is the machine most houses in this county are already piped and vented for.

A heat pump still earns its place in one way a furnace cannot: it cools the house too. It runs as your air conditioner all summer and as your heat source the rest of the year, one system instead of two. If your air conditioner is due for replacement anyway, that is worth weighing against the running cost. If you already have working central air and a gas line to the house, a gas furnace costs less to run and asks nothing new of the house.

Sources: NOAA nClimDiv · NOAA 1991–2020 seasonal normals · Census ACS 2020–2024 · EIA SEDS 2024 · 10 CFR 430.32 · PNNL Building America guide · PNNL-37127 field study · ENERGY STAR product criteria

Snow-covered entrance to a blue shingled house with a white storm door, stone steps, a dry stone wall topped with snow, and a stacked firewood pile under the eaves.

Common questions about heat pumps and furnaces

  • Can a heat pump heat a house through a Pennsylvania winter?

    It can, but it needs help on the coldest nights. A standard heat pump's output falls below its rating once it's under 40°F outside, and the overnight low here averages 20°F across December, January and February, with about 145 nights a year at or below freezing. That's why most homes here pair one with a backup heat source rather than running on the heat pump alone.

  • Do I need backup heat with a heat pump here?

    Most homeowners here will want it. A standard heat pump's heating efficiency drops below about 35°F outside, and the overnight low falls to freezing on about 145 nights a year in Venango County, well past that mark. An ENERGY STAR Cold Climate heat pump holds onto more of its capacity in cold weather, but even those are commonly installed alongside a backup source for the handful of nights that reach 0°F.

  • Can I keep my furnace and add a heat pump?

    Yes, and here that pairing makes sense. A heat pump and a furnace can share the same ductwork, with the heat pump doing the work on milder days and the furnace taking over when it's cold enough to need it. Given that the overnight low here averages 20°F in winter, and falls to freezing on about 145 nights a year, there's a real number of nights where that furnace would be doing the heavy lifting.

  • Is a heat pump cheaper to run than a furnace in Venango County?

    No, a furnace costs less to run here. Heating this way with a heat pump comes to $2.37 per 100,000 Btu against $1.64 for a gas furnace, at Pennsylvania's average fuel prices. That gap is built on each machine's federal minimum efficiency, and it doesn't include backup heat, which would add to the heat pump's number on the coldest nights.

A person in a blue shirt and work gloves connects blue and red gauge hoses to the service valves of a gray outdoor air conditioning condenser unit on a concrete pad beside a blue-sided house, with an open tool bag and wrenches on the mulch in the foreground.

Tell us about the job

Takes about a minute. No obligation.

Step 1 of 3: Equipment