How many solar panels do I need for heat pumps?

Illustrations of a heat pump and a home with question marks

Heat pumps are an incredible investment in your home's energy efficiency, but the savings don't have to stop there. Powering your heat pump with solar panels essentially guarantees lower energy costs, while decreasing your carbon footprint even more than a heat pump alone. 

More than half of a typical home’s energy use goes toward heating and cooling. So if you can run your HVAC with clean solar power, you can shrink your power bills, and you’re well on your way to a net zero home. 

Plus, the cheaper you can make your electricity, the better the chances you’ll save money in the long run by switching to a heat pump for your heating and cooling. 

So how do you size a solar power system to match what a heat pump needs? We’ll show you how to estimate.

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Key takeaways

  • An average home would need between 9 to 13 solar panels to power a whole-house heat pump.

  • But most homes aren't average, and the realistic range is anywhere from 1 to 42 panels, depending on the house and part of the country.

  • Those numbers could also look different for partial-home heat pumps (mini splits), or with certain solar billing policies.

  • Heat pumps and rooftop solar systems are highly individualized. Use the EnergySage Marketplace to find local professionals to help you.

Based on an EnergySage analysis of a Department of Energy database, the median annual electricity use for a typical heat pump in the U.S. is about 5,475 kWh per year. The likely range is anywhere between 400 kWh and 22,500 kWh depending on your house, climate, and some details about the heat pump itself. We get into a lot of those nuances and possibilities in another article, but you can use the table below for some rough estimates.

Average heat pump electricity usage

Heating efficiency: sCOP 2.5. Cooling efficiency: SEER 15. Lower percentiles are more likely to represent smaller, more efficient homes. Units in kWh.

Climate Zone (Example City)
10th Percentile
25th Percentile
50th Percentile
75th Percentile
90th Percentile
1A (Miami)2,0633,0274,9607,50610,532
2A (Houston)2,0253,1214,9837,84411,564
2B (Phoenix)2,4063,8576,0828,83812,337
3A (Atlanta)2,0843,4965,9819,46713,882
3B (San Diego)1,0631,6652,9555,3718,775
3C (San Francisco)3747861,7323,6186,130
4A (D.C., St. Louis)2,0133,6906,67411,07116,597
4B (Amarillo)1,1582,5075,1509,02813,661
4C (Seattle)6521,7143,8006,78710,336
5A (Boston, Chicago)2,6294,8708,46813,19118,931
5B (Denver)1,5562,9985,5809,27913,776
6A (Minneapolis)2,6775,0648,78613,73119,757
6B (Billings)1,8843,8677,02711,65817,589
7A (Minot)3,4386,26410,37615,92422,580
7B (Aspen)1,1522,7285,82610,35817,558
All Zones1,0572,3305,47510,80217,564

All of these figures assume that a heat pump will be the sole heating and cooling system in your home. Today’s high-performance models can actually pull that off, even in extremely cold climates.

If you’re installing a mini-split for only a part of your home, you’d budget for less energy use—we’ve also made some estimates (based on the DOE database) for the amount of electricity a heat pump might use per square foot, which can be a decent way to estimate a partial-home system's energy use. 

Backup or hybrid heating systems for cold weather can change the math, too. Electric strip heat will increase your electricity usage, while a fossil-fuel system will decrease your electricity usage. We don’t have good estimates for either of these scenarios, because it depends on too many fine details, but an HVAC pro can help you get a ballpark estimate.

Some parts of the U.S. get more sunshine (and snow!) than others, and some roofs are laid out for better sun exposure, depending on the direction, tilt, and shading. That all affects how much electricity your solar panels will produce in a given year.

Installers who bid on projects through the EnergySage Marketplace usually include production estimates in their quotes. We’ve analyzed those estimates, and put together some rough guidelines for typical annual solar panel generation in different parts of the country. 

These numbers assume that you’d install 400-watt solar panels, which was the most popular panel output on the EnergySage Marketplace through the first half of 2023.

Average production per solar panel by U.S. region

Region
Annual Electricity Production Per Solar Panel (k Wh)
Northeast (e.g. MA, NY)460 kWh
Mid-Atlantic (e.g. MD, VA)490 kWh
Southeast (e.g. FL, GA)540 kWh
Midwest (e.g. IL, OH)480 kWh
Southwest (e.g. AZ, TX)660 kWh
Pacific Northwest (e.g. OR, WA)430 kWh
Mountain West (e.g. CO, UT)580 kWh
West Coast (e.g. CA)640 kWh

Again, these are just estimates, and your solar installer might make different projections based on your roof shape, nearby shading, and the local weather. 

They also don’t account for the cash value of your solar energy, which can vary based on incentives and billing policies. (More on that below.)

Once you have an idea of how much energy you’ll need to run a heat pump in your home, and how much energy you could produce per panel per year, you can do some simple math to get a sense of how many solar panels you’ll need to offset a heat pump’s electricity usage. 

The estimates can vary wildly depending on your home and local climate, so plug in the numbers as accurately as possible. Some examples:

Property Details
Energy Use In K Wh
K Wh Per Panel
Panels Needed
Boston, statistically average house8,46846019
Atlanta, 500 sq. ft. addition1,9555404
San Francisco, small efficient house3746401
Minneapolis, big drafty house19,75747042

If you’re eligible for solar net metering (that is, full credit for solar power on your electric bill) then your estimate is complete. That’s how many solar panels you'll need to match your heat pump’s energy consumption.

If your utility company offers a partial billing credit (they buy your excess solar for a discount), then the math might look different. 

One option is to install extra solar panels. This can make sense when the utility’s markdown is pretty modest (like in Michigan, for example). 

But if it’s a big billing penalty (like under California’s new rules), it typically makes more sense to add battery storage, so you can hoard more of your solar power instead of giving it away to the utility company.

The closer you can get to installing enough solar panels to offset the energy use from your heat pump and all the other electric stuff in your home, the lower your energy costs will be in the long run.

When you register for the EnergySage Marketplace, vetted local installers will compete for your business—for solar panels, for batteries, for heat pumps, or all of the above. Throughout the process, you’ll be able to talk to a dedicated Energy Advisor, who can help you compare quotes and walk you through all your options. Sign up to learn more today.

Upgrade your heating & cooling with a heat pump
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  • Access the lowest prices from installers near you
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