Energia Price Increase, October 2026

From Monday 12 October 2026, Energia raises residential electricity bills by an average of 4.73% and gas bills by 9.38%, which the company puts at roughly €87 and €143 a year. On the headline it is the softest of the autumn increases. On the tariff table it is nothing of the sort. Energia's own published rates show day unit rates rising between 0% and 3%, night rates rising 25% to 28%, EV charging rates rising 20% to 30% and the standing charge on the two EV tariffs rising 28%. If your solar setup involves a battery or a car charging after midnight, this increase costs you a good deal more than the average suggests.

The New Rates, Side by Side

Energia publishes both sets of figures on its own tariff page, the rates in force now and the rates from 12 October. Every number below is excluding VAT, taken from that page, and every before-and-after pair is the same tariff rather than two different products put side by side. Domestic electricity and gas carry 9% VAT.

The last two rows are blank on purpose. Energia lists Smart 24 Hour and Smart Day Night in the new table but not in the existing one, so there is no matching before rate to quote, and pairing them with a different tariff would invent a change that nobody can check.

Why 4.73% Is the Wrong Number for a Solar Home

An average bill increase tells you what happens to a household that uses electricity the way the average household does. Solar homes do not. They buy very little during the day, because the panels cover it, and they buy disproportionately in the dark, which is precisely where this increase lands.

Look at the shape rather than the size. On the Standard Smart Tariff the day rate rises 1.16c and the night rate rises 6.34c, so more than five times as much of the increase is charged after 11pm. On the standard Day/Night meter the day rate does not move at all and the night rate goes up a quarter. Energia says the change reflects wholesale volatility and higher network charges, and the Commission for Regulation of Utilities did approve network charges adding about €41.25 to a typical domestic bill from 1 October, partly offset by a 66% cut in the PSO levy on the same date. Neither of those is a night-time cost. The decision to load the increase onto off-peak units is Energia's own.

Panels Only: Almost a Wash

If you have solar and no battery, most of what you generate is used in the house during daylight hours. That self-consumption is worth whatever you would otherwise have paid for a daytime unit, and Energia's daytime unit is going up by 3%.

Take a household self-consuming 1,200 kWh a year of its own generation on the Standard Smart Tariff. Before the change that avoided cost is worth €505.56 including VAT. After it, €520.68. Your panels earn you about €15 a year more than they did. Over the same period the standing charge rises from €265.01 to €278.27 including VAT, an extra €13.26 that no amount of generation can touch, because you pay it for being connected rather than for using anything. For a panels-only home the two roughly cancel.

That is a calculation from stated assumptions, not a figure Energia publishes. Change the self-consumption and the answer changes with it. The direction holds though: on this particular increase, solar panels on their own protect you from very little of it, because very little of it is charged in daylight.

Batteries: the Same Change Cuts Both Ways

Home batteries in Ireland are used in two quite different ways, and this price change pushes them in opposite directions.

Storing your own solar gets better. A unit you generate, store and use after dark used to save you 24.70c including VAT. From 12 October it saves 31.61c. Against the 18.5c you would have earned by exporting that same unit, the gain from storing it instead more than doubles, from 6.20c to 13.11c a unit. Every kilowatt-hour you keep for the evening is worth more than it was a month ago.

Charging the battery off the grid at night gets worse. The other strategy, filling the battery on a cheap night rate and using it during the day, lives entirely on the gap between the night rate and the day rate. On the Standard Smart Tariff that gap was 15.99c a unit excluding VAT. From 12 October it is 10.81c, a fall of almost a third. Measured against the peak rate it narrows from 20.74c to 16.57c. A household grid-charging 5 kWh a night through the winter half-year, roughly 1,000 kWh, pays €316.10 including VAT instead of €247, an extra €69 for exactly the same electricity.

So the question is no longer just whether a battery is worth it, but what you intend to fill it with. Our pages on home battery storage in Ireland and whether a battery is worth adding to solar work through the cost side of that.

EV Tariffs Take the Heaviest Hit on the Whole Price List

The largest percentage increases Energia is making are not on electricity in general. They are on the two tariffs built for electric cars. The charge-time rate on EV Smart Drive rises 30%, the charge-time rate on EV Smart Drive Plus rises 20%, and the standing charge on both rises 28%, from €243.13 to €311.21 a year excluding VAT. The day, night and peak rates on those tariffs do not move at all.

Put numbers on it. A driver charging 3,000 kWh a year at home on EV Smart Drive pays €314.10 including VAT for that charging today and €408.30 from 12 October, an extra €94.20. Add the standing charge going from €265.01 to €339.22 including VAT and the bill rises about €168 a year before anything else in the house is counted, against a headline increase of roughly €87. Again, our arithmetic from Energia's published rates, not a figure the company quotes, and it scales with how much you charge.

It is still cheap electricity in absolute terms. 13.61c including VAT for car charging is less than half the 24-hour rate, and if you have solar the daytime alternative is free. The point is narrower: the EV tariff's advantage over an ordinary smart tariff shrank considerably this month, so it is worth checking that yours still earns the standing charge it carries. Our guide to home EV chargers in Ireland covers the hardware side.

The Export Rate Did Not Change

Energia still pays 18.5c per kWh for exported solar under the Clean Export Guarantee, confirmed on its own microgeneration page on 14 September 2026. The 12 October announcement is about the electricity you buy, not the electricity you sell, and there is no export cap on a smart meter.

That leaves Energia mid-table. The best standard export rate open to any Irish solar home is 19.5c from Electric Ireland and SSE Airtricity, with Energia level on 18.5c with Bord Gáis Energy, Flogas and Pinergy. Our Clean Export Guarantee rate comparison keeps every supplier's current figure, and the detail of Energia's own scheme is on our Energia microgeneration rate page.

One consequence worth noticing. Exporting pays 18.5c, and from 12 October the electricity you buy back at night costs 31.61c including VAT. Export has gone from being worth three quarters of a night-time unit to under three fifths. Keeping your generation, by using it in the house or storing it, is worth more relative to selling it than at any point this year.

Energia Joins a Crowded Autumn of Price Rises

The autumn has been busy, and Energia's is the softest headline in it.

• Electric Ireland raised residential electricity 8% and gas 7.7% from 1 July 2026.
• Pinergy raised electricity 7.6% from 14 September 2026, having cut its export rate from 25c to 18.5c six weeks earlier.
• SSE Airtricity announced an 8.9% electricity increase from 5 October 2026, about €171.55 a year, affecting close to 300,000 variable-rate customers.
• Bord Gáis Energy follows with a 9.1% electricity increase from 9 October 2026, about €177 a year.
• PrepayPower, Yuno Energy and Flogas all moved earlier in the year.

Gary Ryan, Energia's managing director, put the change down to "ongoing global volatility of wholesale energy markets and increased network charges". Daragh Cassidy of bonkers.ie made the point that matters for this site: the electricity figure "is just an average, as those on an EV tariff or a smart electricity tariff will see much more substantial increases at certain times of the day". The wider run of Irish prices this year is on our page on electricity prices in Ireland in 2026.

What Energia Customers Should Actually Do

• Find out which tariff you are on before judging the increase. A 24-hour standard customer sees 2%. A smart Day/Night customer who does most of their washing after 11pm sees close to 28% on that portion of the bill.
• If you grid-charge a battery, redo the sums. The night-to-day gap that pays for that strategy narrows by about a third from 12 October.
• If you are on an EV tariff, check it still pays. The standing charge rises 28% and charge-time units rise 20% to 30%, while the ordinary rates on those plans stay put.
• You have 30 days to leave without penalty. Energia's own notice confirms customers in contract can terminate within 30 days of being notified, and existing discounts carry over to the new rates.
• If you do not have panels yet, this is a nudge rather than a shove. Daytime electricity rose only 3%, but the SEAI solar grant is still worth up to €1,800 and export still pays 18.5c. Our page on the best electricity plan for solar owners compares the whole package rather than the export rate alone.

Frequently Asked Questions