PHED Tariff Bands 2026: What Port Harcourt Electricity Actually Costs Per Unit

Port Harcourt Electricity Distribution Company covers four states — Rivers, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa and Cross River — the commercial and industrial heart of Nigeria's South-South, including the oil and gas hubs of Port Harcourt and Uyo. It's also, band for band, the most expensive of the major DisCos below Band A, a fact that rarely comes up when people compare their bills to a friend's in Lagos or Abuja.

The short answer

Band A is ₦209.50/kWh — identical across all 11 NERC-regulated DisCos, and frozen at that level since July 2024.
PHED's Bands B–E have been frozen since December 2022: Band B ₦68.96/kWh, Band C ₦56.38/kWh, Band D ₦39.67/kWh, Band E ₦39.44/kWh.
Any customer using 50kWh or less in a whole month pays a flat ₦4/kWh on all of it, whatever their band. That's the lifeline tariff.
On a 200kWh month, PHED's Band C rate costs ₦2,116 more than the same 200kWh on Ikeja Electric's Band C, and ₦918 more than AEDC's Band C — for identical electricity, identical hours of supply.

These figures are read directly from NERC's published Multi-Year Tariff Order tables for PHED on nerc.gov.ng, not from a comparison blog.

The full PHED band table

| Band | Guaranteed supply | PHED rate (₦/kWh) | |---|---|---| | A | 20+ hrs/day | 209.50 | | B | 16–20 hrs/day | 68.96 | | C | 12–16 hrs/day | 56.38 | | D | 8–12 hrs/day | 39.67 | | E | 4–8 hrs/day | 39.44 |

Unlike AEDC, where Bands D and E converge on the same figure, PHED keeps a small gap between them — 23 kobo/kWh, small enough that it rarely changes a household's monthly bill by more than a few hundred naira.

Why your bill didn't move even though NERC published a new order

NERC issues a "minor review" MYTO order for every DisCo roughly monthly, PHED included — most recently the September 2026 order. Almost none of these change what you're billed. The overwhelming majority only rebalance the subsidy and remittance arithmetic between the DisCo and the federal government — money moving between institutions, not a new number on your meter.

The customer-facing figures have stayed still for a while: Band A at ₦209.50/kWh since July 2024, PHED's Bands B–E since December 2022. Unless PHED has directly notified you of a change — DisCos are required to — assume your rate is what's in the table above.

What a ₦10,000 recharge buys

Most PHED customers on a working prepaid meter care about one number: how many units a recharge buys.

Band A: ₦10,000 ÷ ₦209.50 ≈ 47.7 units
Band B: ₦10,000 ÷ ₦68.96 ≈ 145.0 units
Band C: ₦10,000 ÷ ₦56.38 ≈ 177.4 units
Band D: ₦10,000 ÷ ₦39.67 ≈ 252.1 units
Band E: ₦10,000 ÷ ₦39.44 ≈ 253.5 units

The same ₦10,000 buys 5.3 times more electricity on Band D than on Band A — the entire logic of the Service-Based Tariff: you're billed for reliability of supply, not just kilowatt-hours.

One trap worth naming: the lifeline rate applies to your total monthly consumption, not a single recharge. A ₦500 top-up doesn't put you on ₦4/kWh unless your whole month stays at or under 50kWh — one fridge and a handful of bulbs, for most households.

Port Harcourt versus Lagos and Abuja: the gap nobody quotes

Band A being uniform nationally hides how differently the other bands are priced. Here's the same 200kWh month across five DisCos:

| DisCo | Band B | Band C | Band D | |---|---|---|---| | PHED (Port Harcourt) | ₦13,792 | ₦11,276 | ₦7,934 | | KEDCO (Kano) | ₦13,058 | ₦9,514 | ₦6,404 | | AEDC (Abuja) | ₦12,670 | ₦10,358 | ₦6,790 | | IKEDC (Ikeja) | ₦12,496 | ₦9,160 | ₦6,248 | | EKEDC (Eko) | ₦12,200 | ₦9,706 | ₦6,496 |

PHED is the most expensive of the five on every one of these bands. A PHED Band C customer pays ₦2,116 more per 200kWh month than an Ikeja Electric Band C customer, and ₦1,686 more on Band D — for the same units, at the same nominal service level. Over a year, that Band C gap is roughly ₦25,390.

Estimate your PHED bill or check what your recharge buys →

If you think you're on the wrong band

Your band is tied to the feeder serving your street — not something you pick or negotiate. It's printed on your bill or vending receipt. What's worth checking is whether the supply you actually get matches what you're billed for: NERC's framework requires DisCos to downgrade customers who consistently don't receive their guaranteed hours, and a Band A customer getting Band C hours is paying nearly four times the correct rate. Log it with PHED, and keep your own record of daily supply hours — a written log is the only evidence you'll have if you escalate.

Tariff figures are sourced from NERC's published Multi-Year Tariff Orders for PHED, checked as of September 2026. Band A has been frozen at ₦209.50/kWh since July 2024 and PHED's Bands B–E since December 2022, but tariffs are set by regulatory order and can change — confirm against your actual bill if a figure here looks out of date. This article is general information, not financial advice.