Electricity consumers will see a small reduction in their power bills starting in January after regulators cut a key renewable energy charge collected from households and businesses.

The Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) has approved a lower Feed-in Tariff Allowance (FIT-All) rate of 20.11 centavos per kilowatt-hour (kWh) for 2026, down 62 centavos per kWh from the current rate charged by National Transmission Corp. (TransCo).

The FIT-All is a pass-through charge paid by consumers to compensate renewable energy plants for the electricity they generate under the government’s Feed-in Tariff system.

“For the first time since the FIT implementation began, the ERC has been able to set the FIT-All rate before the year it is meant to be applied,” ERC chairperson Francis Saturnino Juan said in an interview with reporters.

“This demonstrates the ERC’s commitment to acting swiftly and with urgency on all filings, thereby fostering a more stable and predictable regulatory environment,” he added.

The ruling stemmed from TransCo’s 15 July application seeking approval of the 2026 FIT-All rate.

Nationwide hearings

The ERC held public and virtual hearings across Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao from September to October 2025.

At the same time, the ERC approved long-pending adjustments to Feed-in Tariff rates covering 2021 to 2025, which will now be recovered by eligible renewable energy plants over five years starting 2026.

The adjusted rates apply to biomass, run-of-river hydro, solar, and wind projects from earlier FIT rounds.

“The approval marks the first adjustment to the FIT scheme since 2020,” Juan said. “It underscores our commitment to uphold and ensure the success of the FIT System as enshrined in the RE Act,” he added.

Separately, the ERC approved, with modifications, TransCo’s application to collect a Green Energy Auction Allowance (GEA-All) of P0.0371 per kWh, effective January billing.

The GEA-All is another charge passed on to on-grid consumers to fund payments to power plants contracted under the Green Energy Auction Program.

The ERC ordered distribution utilities, retail electricity suppliers, the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines, and the Independent Electricity Market Operator of the Philippines to make records available for an immediate audit.

The Commission also directed collection agents to remit all GEA-All proceeds in full to the GEA-All Fund by the 15th day of the month following each billing period. It required that the charge appear as a separate line item on electricity bills.