The honest case against a heat pump

We built a tool that estimates whether a heat pump will save you money. Most of the time, in most Canadian provinces, the answer is yes. But "most of the time" is not "every time," and giving anyone a generic recommendation without looking at their numbers is bad advice.

Here are the cases where the math, the situation, or the priorities point a different direction.

1. You heat with natural gas in a province where gas is cheap and electricity is not

Alberta is the clearest example. Residential delivered natural gas in Alberta runs around $8 per gigajoule. Residential electricity runs around $0.17 per kilowatt-hour, which works out to roughly $47 per gigajoule of electricity. A 92%-efficient gas furnace delivers heat at about $8.70 per GJ; a heat pump with a seasonal COP of 2.5 delivers heat at about $19 per GJ. The heat pump costs more than twice as much per unit of heat as the gas furnace, every winter, for the life of the equipment.

Saskatchewan is similar though slightly less extreme. Parts of Ontario can also tip this way if you are on a fixed-price gas plan and pay tier-2 electricity rates.

Switching anyway might still make sense if you want air conditioning you do not currently have, or if you want to reduce combustion in the home for health reasons, or if you place a high value on lowering your direct emissions even when the electricity grid is fossil-fuel-heavy. But framing the decision as financial does not work in these provinces. Be honest with yourself about why you're switching.

2. You burn cheap wood and your supply chain is reliable

Cordwood at $300 a cord, burned in a 65%-efficient stove, delivers heat at roughly $22 per gigajoule. A heat pump in New Brunswick delivers heat at about $16 per GJ, which on paper makes the heat pump slightly cheaper. But this comparison forgets two things.

First, many rural wood users do not pay $300 a cord. If you have your own woodlot, the marginal cost of an extra cord is essentially zero. The heat pump cannot beat free.

Second, wood has properties that heat pumps do not. It provides a backup if the power goes out. It heats reliably at any outdoor temperature, including the –35°C night when the heat pump's COP is barely above 1.0. For a remote property where power outages are common and a cold house is a real safety concern, the wood stove is not just a heater. It is insurance.

The case for adding a heat pump as a secondary system, used in mild weather and for summer cooling, can still be strong. Just don't expect to displace the stove.

3. You're planning to sell within a few years

A heat pump install in Canada typically costs between $14,000 and $30,000 before rebates, depending on home size and complexity. Even with maximum federal and provincial rebates, the net cost is often $6,000 to $15,000. If you save $2,500 a year on heating, the equipment pays for itself in five or six years.

If you are planning to sell the house in two or three years, you only capture a fraction of those savings. The question becomes whether a heat pump increases your sale price by enough to cover the gap.

The honest answer is: maybe, but not always. In Maritime Canada, where oil heat is common and home buyers actively prefer heat pumps, a recent install can move a sale price. In parts of the country where gas is cheap and buyers don't care, the resale uplift is smaller. The data on this is uneven because heat pump adoption in Canada is still recent enough that appraisers have limited comparable sales.

If you're selling soon, run the math conservatively and assume you'll recover 50 cents on the dollar of your net investment at resale. If the rest of the savings during your ownership period still beat the equipment cost, proceed. If not, leave the upgrade for the next owner to do.

4. Your home is leaky and badly insulated, and you haven't fixed that yet

Heat pumps perform best in tight, well-insulated homes. They run continuously at part load, delivering steady warmth. In a leaky pre-1960 home with single-pane windows and R-8 wall insulation, the heat load is so large that the heat pump runs at full output for most of the heating season, hits its minimum-temperature performance ceiling on cold nights, and leans heavily on backup heat.

This still works, in the sense that the house stays warm. But the COP averaged across the year drops significantly, the equipment has to be larger and more expensive, and the savings versus the existing fuel shrink.

The correct order of operations is: insulate and air-seal first, then size the heat pump to the improved load. A blower-door test, attic top-up, basement rim-joist insulation, and weatherstripping can knock 20% to 40% off your design heat load. That makes the heat pump cheaper to buy and more efficient to run.

If you skip envelope improvements because you want the rebate before it expires, you'll likely buy an oversized unit that performs worse than a smaller unit would have done in an upgraded house. Some provincial programs (like NB Power's Total Home Energy Savings Program) actually require you to do envelope work before they'll pay the heat pump rebate, which is the right way around.

5. You have ductwork that can't handle a heat pump's airflow

Air-source heat pumps move a lot of air. The supply air temperature is lower than a furnace produces (around 32°C vs 45°C for a typical furnace), so to deliver the same heat you need more cubic feet per minute of flow. Many older homes have ducts that were sized for a hot, low-flow furnace. Pushing heat pump-rated airflow through them produces noise, uneven room temperatures, and reduced equipment efficiency.

The fix is to upgrade the ductwork. This can cost $1,500 to $5,000 depending on how much needs to change. In some homes, particularly bungalows with finished basements, the duct work is buried and hard to reach. The job becomes a renovation rather than an HVAC install.

The alternative is to go ductless. Install one or more wall-mounted "mini-split" heads instead of using the central duct system. This works well in open floor plans and in additions, but it can leave bedrooms and bathrooms underconditioned in homes with many small rooms. Multi-zone systems with five or six indoor heads exist but are expensive and complicated.

None of this is a deal-breaker, but it is a cost most online quotes don't include. If your contractor's quote doesn't mention your existing duct condition, ask why.

When a heat pump is still the right answer

Most Canadians do not face the situations above. If you heat with oil or propane, a heat pump almost always saves money. If you heat with electric baseboards, a heat pump cuts your heating cost by roughly 60% and your emissions by more in any province with a clean grid. If you live in a climate that gets hot in summer and you currently have no air conditioning, the heat pump replaces a furnace and an AC for the price of one piece of equipment.

The point of this article is not to talk you out of a heat pump. It is to make sure you go in with eyes open and have an honest reason. If your reason is "the check said I'll save $2,000 a year," fine. That is a fact and you will. If your reason is "I want a heat pump because heat pumps are good," look at the trade-offs first.

Run your numbers through the check. If the verdict comes back "modest savings" or "may not save money," read it carefully before signing a contract.