Illinois Heating

Heat pump vs furnace in Livingston County, Illinois

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Heat pump or furnace, one form

Which costs less to run in Livingston County?

An outdoor air conditioning condenser unit with a top-mounted fan grille sits on a concrete pad surrounded by gravel, beside a dark horizontal-lap sided wall with a small electrical disconnect box.

Heat pump

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

A beige furnace with louvered panels stands against a dark blue basement wall, with metal ductwork, a flue pipe, and conduit above it, lit by a bare ceiling bulb.

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?

  • Steady, even comfort

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

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  • No gas line, nothing burning in the house

    A heat pump runs on electricity alone. Nothing burns inside the house.

    Kitchen interior with a navy island topped by a wood counter and black induction hob holding a pale blue kettle, cream wall cabinets with a built-in black double oven, glass pendant lights, a vase of blue hydrangeas, and glass doors showing a fenced garden.

  • Heats and cools in one system

    A heat pump runs the same way all year. It pulls heat into the house in winter and pushes it out in summer.

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Where does a furnace shine?

  • Strong, steady heat in hard cold

    Nights here average 19°F through December, January and February. A furnace puts out hot air from the first cycle and keeps up without strain no matter how cold it gets outside.

    A dark navy two-story house with white trim, dormer windows and a covered porch, its windows glowing yellow at dusk, with a shoveled path through deep snow leading to the steps and a lit lamp post at right.

  • Runs on the gas most homes here already use

    Most homes in Livingston County already heat with gas, so the line running to your house is probably there. A furnace just puts that connection to work instead of asking for a new fuel source.

    A row of wood-sided houses with covered front porches and painted railings along a snowy sidewalk, with a gas meter at the near house and a person in a dark coat walking in the distance under bare trees.

  • 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 in a basement with a blue painted block wall and a metal shelf holding bins.

What your winter actually demands

Winter here is long and it gets genuinely cold. Heat runs eight months a year, October through May. The overnight low averages 19°F across December, January and February, and about 125 nights a year dip to freezing or below. That's roughly half the nights in the whole heating season.

A standard heat pump starts losing ground before it even gets that cold. Below 40°F it puts out less heat than its rating says. Below about 35°F it typically needs backup heat to make up the difference. Your average winter night here, 19°F, is below both marks, and every single one of those 125 freezing nights is too. This is not a county where the cold stays mild enough for a standard heat pump to coast through winter on its own.

A cold-climate heat pump changes that math. To earn the ENERGY STAR Cold Climate label, it has to keep making heat efficiently and still deliver most of its rated capacity at 5°F, tested by someone other than the manufacturer. Field tests of these units in real homes back this up: backup heat covered only a small share of the load between 0°F and 35°F, and running on backup alone was rare even above 0°F. So the question is not whether a heat pump can work here. It's which kind.

A gas furnace does not have this problem at any temperature. It burns gas to make heat, and the cold outside does not touch how much heat it makes. For the 8 nights a year that fall to 0°F or below, that steadiness matters more than it does on an ordinary January night.

A row of two-story wood-sided houses in dark blue and light blue with covered porches, flanked by brick houses, with snow on the roofs, icicles along the eaves, and a plowed snowbank along the street.

What it costs to run, and what to weigh against it

Run the two side by side on Illinois's own prices and the furnace wins on cost. A gas furnace makes 100,000 Btu of heat for $1.33. A heat pump makes the same heat for $2.12. That is at least 37 percent more, and that heat pump figure already assumes the mild end of its range, with nothing added for backup heat on the coldest nights. A standard heat pump here will lean on backup heat often enough that its real cost runs higher than that number, not lower. A cold-climate model, which needs backup far less, will land closer to it.

Gas is also simply what most of this county already uses. Utility gas heats 68.4% of homes here, about two in three. Electric heat and propane each account for a little over one in ten. If your house is already piped for gas, staying on a furnace means using the line that's already there instead of adding a new way to make heat.

The furnace's drawback is that it only heats. For the three months a year cooling runs here, June through August, it does nothing, and you need a separate air conditioner to fill that gap. A heat pump handles both jobs in one system, which is worth something if you are weighing the cost of a furnace against the cost of a furnace plus a separate AC.

So the choice comes down to this. If keeping winter costs as low as possible matters most, and your house already runs on gas, a furnace paired with central air is the cheaper path here. If you want one system for both seasons and are willing to pay more to run it, a heat pump can do the job through this county's winters, but it should be a cold-climate model, not a standard one, given how often you'll be below that 35°F mark.

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

A two-story navy blue house with white trim, a small columned front porch and light blue front door, with a shoveled concrete walkway leading across a snow-covered front yard and bare trees overhead.

Common questions about heat pumps and furnaces

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

    Yes, but a standard one struggles on the coldest nights here. Below 40°F a standard heat pump puts out less than its rated heat, and below about 35°F it often needs backup heat. Your winter lows average 19°F, so most of the heating season sits below both marks. A heat pump built to the ENERGY STAR Cold Climate spec is tested to hold most of its heat down to 5°F, so if you're set on a heat pump, that's the one that fits here.

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

    Most winters, yes. A standard heat pump's output falls below its rating once it's under 40°F outside, and it often needs backup heat below about 35°F. The average overnight low here is 19°F, and about 125 nights a year hit freezing or below, so backup heat would get used more years than not. A cold-climate rated heat pump needs it less, since it's built to keep most of its capacity down to 5°F.

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

    Yes, and it's a common setup. The heat pump carries the mild stretches and the furnace switches on once it gets too cold for the heat pump to keep up, usually somewhere below 35°F outside. Most of your 125 nights at or below freezing each year would fall in that range, so the furnace would still see real use.

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

    No, a furnace runs cheaper here. A furnace costs $1.33 per 100,000 Btu of heat on Illinois gas prices, against $2.12 for a heat pump on electric rates, so the furnace costs less to make the same heat. That heat pump number also assumes no backup heat ran, which most winters here isn't the case.

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