Press Statement

Preasráiteas

03 February 2021

Go to release: Fuel Excise Clearances December 2020

The Central Statistics Office (CSO) has today (03 February 2021) published Fuel Excise Clearances for December 2020. The report shows the monthly trends for the main transport and heating fuels since 2000.

Statistician in the Environment and Climate Division Paul McElvaney commented: “The monthly trends in clearances of autodiesel and petrol since March 2020 have closely mirrored the pandemic mobility restrictions.

Clearances of petrol in December 2020 were 37% higher than November 2020 indicating a large increase in road travel by households.

Petrol is mainly used by households, particularly those located in urban areas. April 2020 was down 72% compared with April 2019 while May 2020 was 50% lower than in May 2019. November 2020 was down 38% on November 2019.

Clearances of autodiesel in April 2020 were 55% lower than in April 2019. May 2020 was 39% below May 2019, September 2020 was 2.7% lower than in September 2019 and November 2020 was 17% lower than in November 2019. Autodiesel clearances increased in December 2020 to 2.4% below December 2019.

The annual 2020 figure for autodiesel was 13.9% below 2019, unleaded petrol was 25.9% lower, marked gas oil was 3.8% higher but there was a 17.7% increase in clearances of kerosene which is mainly used for home heating.”

Statistician in the Environment and Climate Division Dimitri Cernize commented further: “Looking at the annual time series for kerosene since 2000, only 2010 was higher than 2020. This is not surprising as the months of January, February, and December in 2010 had the coldest mean temperatures in the 2000-2020 period for Dublin Airport. Even then the 2020 kerosene figure was only 5.5% below the 2010 figure.”

-- ENDS --