By the 254.ke Newsroom
Kenyan households and businesses will pay an extra Ksh4.1591 for every unit of electricity consumed in September 2026, after the Energy and Petroleum Regulatory Authority (EPRA) gazetted three new pass-through charges on September 18. A household using 100 units this month will see about Ksh416 added to its bill before base tariffs and taxes are even applied — and the increase is bigger, in shillings, the more power a customer uses.
How much more will you actually pay?
The combined Ksh4.1591 per kilowatt-hour (kWh) adjustment is made up of three separate charges: a Ksh3.00 fuel energy cost charge, a Ksh1.1443 foreign exchange fluctuation adjustment, and a Ksh0.0148 Water Resource Management Authority (WRMA) levy. None of these is the base electricity tariff — they are added on top of it.
| Units consumed | Extra pass-through charges (Sept 2026) |
|---|---|
| 50 units | ≈ Ksh208 |
| 100 units | ≈ Ksh416 |
| 200 units | ≈ Ksh832 |
| 300 units | ≈ Ksh1,248 |
| 500 units | ≈ Ksh2,080 |
| 1,000 units | ≈ Ksh4,159 |
| 10,000 units (business) | ≈ Ksh41,591 |
| 50,000 units (business) | ≈ Ksh207,955 |
These figures cover only the new pass-through charges, not the full bill. The total a customer pays still includes the base tariff for their consumption band, plus VAT and other approved levies.
Where does your base tariff fit in?
EPRA’s September 18 gazette notice also formalised three domestic consumption bands, each with its own base rate: DC1-L (the lifeline band, up to 30 units a month) at Ksh12.23 per unit, DC2-O (30 to 100 units) at Ksh16.45 per unit, and DC3-O (100 to 15,000 units) at Ksh19.08 per unit. A customer’s band is now set using a three-month rolling average of their consumption, including the current billing cycle — so a household that creeps past a threshold for a few months running can be moved into a higher band automatically, even without a one-off spike in usage.
Add the Ksh4.1591 pass-through charge to whichever base rate applies, and a DC3-O household paying roughly Ksh19.08 a unit is effectively paying closer to Ksh23.24 a unit before tax this month.
Why the charges are going up this month
The fuel energy cost charge, the largest of the three at Ksh3.00 per kWh, is recalculated monthly using the previous month’s actual generation costs. EPRA’s August data shows total electricity generated and purchased came to just over 1.37 billion kWh, with fuel costs varying sharply by plant. Remote thermal stations serving areas such as Laisamis, Takaba and North Horr recorded fuel costs above Ksh350 per kilogramme, while geothermal plants including Olkaria IV and Sosian Menengai supplied cheaper baseload power.
The foreign exchange adjustment reflects a combined Ksh1.316 billion in currency-related costs across Kenya Power, KenGen and independent power producers (IPPs), with IPPs accounting for roughly Ksh1.121 billion of that figure. The much smaller WRMA levy funds water-resource management tied to hydropower generation at stations such as Gitaru, Kiambere and Turkwel.
How long will the higher charges apply?
The adjustment applies to meter readings taken during September 2026, but because postpaid household bills are read and issued on a rolling schedule through the month, the higher charges will keep showing up on bills into mid-October for customers whose reading dates fall later in the cycle. Prepaid token customers will see the higher rate reflected as soon as they top up during the applicable billing window. EPRA recalculates the fuel and forex components every month, so the Ksh4.1591 figure is not a permanent tariff increase — it can rise or fall in October depending on fuel prices and currency movements in September.
What else changed for solar and business customers
The same gazette notice cut the credit for customers who export excess power to the grid under net-metering arrangements to 50 percent of what they feed in, down from full credit previously. Anyone supplying power to the Kenya Power network without approval — now formally defined as “dumping” — will be billed for it at the applicable base tariff rather than credited. Electric vehicle charging customers face a new Ksh16 per unit daytime rate, or Ksh8 per unit off-peak.
For businesses, the exposure scales quickly: a manufacturer, hotel or cold-storage operator using 50,000 units a month faces roughly Ksh208,000 in additional charges alone this billing cycle. Kenya has already seen a wave of company closures in 2026, and electricity-intensive operators are among those watching margins most closely as costs like this stack up.
The increase lands as Kenya Power reports rising demand rather than falling usage — the utility says electricity sales grew 12.05 percent to 12,777 GWh in the 2025/26 financial year, adding 411,710 new customers and posting revenue of Ksh238.24 billion, up Ksh18.96 billion on the year before. Kenya Power has also continued running planned outages in parts of the country even as it pushes ahead with grid automation and smart-metering investment.
The timing follows weeks of separate scrutiny over energy costs after Uganda’s government raised questions over Kenya’s government-to-government fuel import arrangement, keeping fuel and energy pricing broadly in the news well beyond this month’s power bill.
Frequently asked questions
What is the EPRA fuel energy cost charge?
It is a monthly pass-through charge, recalculated each month, that lets power producers recover the actual cost of fuel used to generate electricity. For September 2026 it is set at Ksh3.00 per kWh, the largest of the three new charges.
Is the Ksh4.16 increase permanent?
No. EPRA recalculates the fuel and foreign exchange components every month using the prior month’s data, so the combined charge can rise or fall in October and beyond depending on fuel costs and currency movements.
Which tariff band am I in?
Domestic customers fall into DC1-L (up to 30 units a month), DC2-O (30 to 100 units) or DC3-O (100 to 15,000 units), based on a three-month rolling average of consumption that Kenya Power now applies automatically.
Do prepaid token customers pay the new charges too?
Yes. The pass-through charges apply to prepaid (token) and postpaid customers alike; token users will see the adjusted rate reflected when they buy units during the applicable billing period.
Why did my solar net-metering credit drop?
EPRA’s September 18 notice reduced the credit for power exported to the grid under net-metering arrangements to 50 percent of the exported units, down from full credit previously.
For the full gazette notice and tariff schedule, see EPRA’s official website.
