Derek Cole explains when heat pumps need electric backup heat to work in cold weather. Backup typically kicks in around 35-40°F depending on your thermostat setting. Without it, a heat pump may struggle to reach target temperatures in freezing conditions.
So in the wintertime, if you're having trouble getting your thermostat to a temperature, if you have a heat pump, if it's been really cold like it's been here recently, the challenge is the electric heat strip or the backup heat could not be working to supplement that heat pump when it's really cold outside. So it is going to need backup heat at about 35, 40 degrees, depending on your set point, your comfort level. So, like, the other night, it was down to 20. So if you don't have electric backup heat, your heat pump's not going to get to 70 in the house like you have it sit on. So it could be a heat strip problem, it could be a backup heat problem. We've seen units that not have even they haven't installed backup heat, so that could be a challenge.
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