Illinois Heating

Heat pump vs furnace in Madison County, Illinois

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For homes in Madison County

Which costs less to run in Madison County?

A gray outdoor condensing unit with a top-mounted fan grille sits on a concrete pad surrounded by gravel, against dark horizontal siding with a wall-mounted electrical disconnect box above it, lit at night.

Heat pump

To heat your home here$2.12per 100,000 Btu

A beige two-panel furnace stands on a concrete basement floor against a dark blue wall, with galvanized ductwork and a flue pipe above it and metal gas piping to the left.

Furnace

To heat your home here$1.33per 100,000 Btu

At Illinois's gas and electricity prices, a gas furnace makes the same heat as a heat pump for at least 37% less.

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

Where does a heat pump shine?

  • Covers a long cooling season

    May through September is five months of real cooling work here. A heat pump handles that stretch the same way it handles heating the rest of the year, so you're not running two different systems to stay comfortable.

    A covered porch with blue horizontal siding, a ceiling fan, wooden posts and railing, wicker furniture with blue cushions and a striped pillow, potted plants, and a glass of iced tea on a dark round table, with green trees beyond.

  • Steady, even comfort

    It eases up and down with the weather. There are fewer swings between too warm and too cool.

    A dimly lit living room with a lamp, a gray armchair holding an open book and navy pillow, a beige sofa, built-in shelves, and a yellow Labrador sleeping on a woven rug beside a wooden table with candles.

  • 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.

    A kitchen with navy lower cabinets, white marble-look countertops, white subway tile backsplash and a stainless range hood, with a blue kettle on the cooktop, a wooden cutting board, potted plants, a utensil crock, and a marble island holding a blue mug and a wooden bowl of citrus.

Where does a furnace shine?

  • Runs on the gas most homes here already use

    Most homes in Madison County already run on gas, 60.7% of them. If yours is one, a furnace just ties into the line that's already there.

    A row of brick houses with dark blue painted porch columns and stone front steps, with a gas meter and piping beside the stairs and snow covering the ground along the sidewalk.

  • Fast, strong heat on demand

    Turn the heat up and the furnace answers right away. There's no long wait for the house to catch up.

    Entryway with a dark blue door, snowy trees seen through a window with a pale blue curtain, snow-dusted boots on a tile floor, a floor vent, and a steaming mug on a wooden bench with a blue fringed throw and coats on hooks.

  • Proven, simple, easy to get serviced

    The design is simple and well understood. That keeps service calls short.

    A gloved hand holds a white pleated air filter in front of a furnace with white pipes, beside shelving holding folded towels, fabric bins, and woven baskets.

What the cold here does to a heat pump

Winter here is the long season, not the short one. Heat runs about seven months, October through April, against five months of cooling. Any machine you pick spends most of its working life heating this house, so that side of the ledger matters more than the summer side.

The overnight low averages 25°F across December, January and February, and about 90 nights a year dip to freezing or below. Both of those numbers sit past the two marks that matter for a standard heat pump. Below 40°F it puts out less heat than its rating says. Below about 35°F it often leans on backup heat to make up the difference. At 25°F average, this county is past both marks on an ordinary winter night, not just on the rare cold snap.

That doesn't mean the heat pump quits. Only about one night a year here reaches 0°F, and cold-climate heat pumps tested over two winters in occupied homes ran mostly on their own power even between 0°F and 35°F, calling on backup heat for only a small share of the work. But that is a cold-climate heat pump built and rated to hold its output near 5°F. A standard heat pump built to the federal minimum is not tested or warrantied to do that, and the running-cost figure for a heat pump on this page assumes the federal minimum, with no backup heat added in.

A two-story navy blue house with light blue trim, a covered front porch with white railings and stone pier bases, surrounded by lawn and fallen orange leaves beneath autumn trees.

What it costs to run, and what it means for your AC

Run the numbers at Illinois prices and the furnace wins on cost. A gas furnace makes the same heat for $1.33 per 100,000 Btu against $2.12 for a heat pump, so the furnace heats this house for at least 37 percent less. Gas is also what most of your neighbors already heat with: utility gas heats about three in five homes in Madison County, electricity about one in three.

A furnace, though, only heats. It has nothing to do the other five months of the year, when you still need an air conditioner, bought and installed separately. A heat pump is the air conditioner, built into the same box that heats the house, and this county gives it a real cooling season to earn that back: about 40 days a year hit 90°F or higher.

So the choice comes down to what you're optimizing for. If keeping the gas furnace you already have, or installing one, and pairing it with a standard central air conditioner is the plan, you get the cheaper heat and a proven setup most local contractors can service without a second thought. If you'd rather run one machine year round and are willing to pay more per unit of heat for it, a heat pump covers the long cooling season and the long heating season both, as long as it's a unit built to hold its output in this county's winters, not the federal minimum figure this page's cost comparison is built on.

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

A single-story red brick house with a gray shingled roof, blue shutters and blue front door, a small covered porch with railing, trimmed shrubs along the foundation, and a concrete walkway crossing a green lawn.

Common questions about heat pumps and furnaces

  • Can a heat pump heat a house through an Illinois winter?

    Yes, but a standard heat pump works harder for less heat once it gets cold. Below 40°F its output drops under its rated capacity, and below about 35°F it often leans on backup heat. The average overnight low here runs 25°F across December, January and February, so that's most winter nights, not a rare cold snap.

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

    Most likely, yes. A standard heat pump's heating efficiency drops below about 35°F outside, and the overnight low here averages 25°F across December, January and February. About 90 nights a year here fall to freezing or below, and all of them sit under that 35°F mark, so backup heat is doing real work most winters, not just on the rare single night that drops to 0°F.

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

    Yes, and in Madison County it solves the one problem a heat pump has on its own: cold nights. A heat pump's output falls below its rating once it's under 40°F outside, and below about 35°F it often needs backup heat to keep up. The furnace covers those nights, the heat pump covers the rest, and you get the cheaper gas rate on the coldest nights when heat is hardest to make.

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

    No, a furnace runs cheaper here. Heating with a furnace costs $1.33 per 100,000 Btu against $2.12 for a heat pump, at Illinois's average gas and electricity prices. That gap is why three out of five homes in Madison County heat with gas.

A man in a dark blue shirt and jeans kneels in a basement, working on white PVC pipes beside a furnace and sheet-metal ductwork, with an open tool bag on the floor nearby.

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