Choosing Heat & Airin Washington
All decisions

Start from your house

Heat, west side

Heat, east side

Oil, propane and wood

Cooling

Wildfire smoke

Damp, crawlspaces and ducts

Money and rules

Decisions Your house East side

What do east side winters and summers ask of your house?

Updated . Sources checked November 3, 2026.

East side heating and cooling starts from NOAA's numbers: Spokane's January low averages 24.7F, with 2.2 nights at or below zero and 20.8 days of 90F or more a year. Pasco averages 54.7 days at 90F or more. So one system, or a pair, has two real jobs.

Rolling green and tan Palouse wheat hills seen from Steptoe Butte.
Rolling green and tan Palouse wheat hills seen from Steptoe Butte.

What to decide, in this order

  • Should a Spokane house have a furnace or a heat pump?

    Spokane's cold is the test, and metered Inland Empire results are the evidence.

    Gas furnace
    Gas homes replacing a failed furnace, with little interest in summer cooling
    Heat pump with back-up
    Electric-heat homes, and gas homes that also want cooling
    An outdoor heat pump unit against a brick wall, with driven snow stuck to its side.

  • Dual fuel or all electric: which heat pump setup fits your house?

    Keeping a newer furnace as back-up is a real east side option.

    Dual fuel (heat pump plus furnace)
    Houses with a gas furnace that is still relatively new
    All electric (heat pump plus electric back-up)
    Houses with no gas, or a furnace at the end of its life
    A worn two-storey old house with a pickup parked in front, in Spokane's Hillyard district.

  • Your AC died: replace it, or install a heat pump instead?

    A dead air conditioner is a natural moment to reconsider heating too.

    New central AC
    Houses with a sound furnace and no wish to change their heating
    Heat pump in its place
    Houses wanting cooling plus heat from one outdoor unit
    A square central-air condenser on a concrete pad beside a brick wall and chain-link fence.

  • Keep burning propane, or switch to a heat pump?

    Rural houses with no gas main, and a fuel with few rebates.

    Keep the propane furnace
    A nearly new furnace and little cooling need
    Switch to a heat pump
    Worn-out furnace, adequate electric service, want cooling too
    Heat pump with propane back-up
    A sound furnace you want to burn less often
    A grey-sided rural house with a white propane tank in the side lawn and a window AC at the rear.

  • Should you keep your wood stove or replace it?

    Burn bans, certification and changeout money that is local and limited.

    Keep the stove
    A certified stove, dry wood, other heat for ban days
    Replace with a certified stove
    An old uncertified stove when wood stays your main heat
    Add a ductless heat pump
    You want heat that works through burn bans
    A log burning behind the glass door of a wood stove in a lived-in home.

  • Evaporative cooler or AC for an east side house?

    Dry summers make it possible, and smoke complicates it.

    Evaporative cooler
    Dry east side house, ready for water use and pad upkeep
    Air conditioning
    Most houses, smoke-prone areas, west side, or where heat pump cooling fits
    AI-generated picture: a plain metal evaporative cooler on the low roof of a 1950s ranch house, with dry tan hills behind.

  • Should you cool one room or the whole house?

    What to do when a heat wave comes before a new system does.

    One cool room
    West side homes, no ducts, a modest budget, a room you can close
    Whole-house cooling
    East side summers, existing ducts, people home through the heat
    An 1894 stucco house with a parched summer lawn and pale driveway in Browne's Addition, Spokane.

  • HEPA air cleaner or MERV 13 filter for wildfire smoke?

    Smoke season arrives whichever heating fuel you burn.

    HEPA room cleaner
    Homes without ducts, and one clean room in any home
    MERV 13 furnace filter
    Homes with ducted forced air and a slot that fits
    A fabric-sleeved room air purifier on a wood floor, beside a skirting board and curtain.

East side normals and records

NOAA and NWSSpokaneYakimaPasco
January low24.7F24.0F27.8F
January high34.5F39.5F41.4F
July high84.4F89.9F92.5F
Heating degree days a year6,462.65,755.85,010.7
Cooling degree days a year514.6606.4787.8
Days of 90F or more a year20.840.254.7
Days with a low of 0F or below2.21.51.2
Record high109F, 6/29/2021113F, 6/29/2021115F, 6/27/2021
Record low-30F, 1/16/1888-25F, 2/1/1950-29F, 12/13/1919

Sources: NOAA normals for Spokane, Yakima and Pasco. Records from NWS annual reports for Spokane, Yakima and Pasco. Airport numbers do not show a valley floor or a high ridge.

Can a heat pump carry an east side winter?

It can do much of the work, but a back-up is normal. ENERGY STAR's Cold Climate rating requires a COP of at least 1.75 at 5F. Spokane's January lows sit well above 5F on average, yet it has dropped far below that on record.

The closest local evidence is NEEA's metering from 2008 and 2009: ductless units in Inland Empire homes averaged a seasonal COP of 2.41, against 3.05 in Puget Sound. On our running-cost table, COP 2.41 comes to $14.47 per million Btu delivered and an 80% gas furnace to $14.56, both our arithmetic at 2024 statewide prices. Gas rose sharply in 2025 and electricity has risen too, so check the table's caveats before leaning on that near-tie.

Rebate news is thin here. Avista's Washington page showed no heat pump rebate amount (archived copy, June 2026), so confirm with the utility. See the utility comparison.

Orange-tinted wildfire smoke filling a dry valley during the 2015 Okanogan Complex Fire.
Orange-tinted wildfire smoke filling a dry valley during the 2015 Okanogan Complex Fire.

Why does cooling count as much as heating here?

Because heat lasts longer and goes higher. Pasco, Yakima and Spokane all set their record highs in June 2021, and a Hanford Site station's 120F from that event is now the state record. The state's smoke guidance says the season typically starts in July or August but can begin as early as May, which can leave open windows off the table for cooling.

That is why replacing a failed air conditioner is a heating question too. The AC or heat pump page walks through it.

A white Craftsman bungalow with a chain-link fence and bare dirt yard in Yakima County.
A white Craftsman bungalow with a chain-link fence and bare dirt yard in Yakima County.

What about wood heat?

Check for a ban before you burn. Ecology keeps a live list. A Stage 1 ban stops uncertified stoves and fireplaces unless a wood stove is the only source of heat. Replacement money is local, such as Spokane Clean Air's changeout, which lists $2,500 toward a ductless heat pump for Spokane County homeowners through Spring 2027, as of November 2026. The wood stove page has the conditions.

Parts and examples

Hard water only matters here if you are weighing an evaporative cooler, where minerals can build up on the pads. It has no bearing on a heat pump or furnace. A hardness, iron and pH field test kit from Quality Water Treatment, which shares an owner with this site, is one way to learn your water's numbers before you choose. Softening is a separate household decision, not a cooling one: SoftPro Water Systems, which also shares an owner with this site, sells softeners. Check a cooler's manual before feeding it softened water.

Decide next

Where this came from