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What the litre looks like right now
This is the main visual answer. The cards below show how much of the litre is the fuel itself, how much is tax, and how much is everything else.
Petrol
EUR 1.8805/L
Final retail price
EUR 0.5297 fuel itself
EUR 0.3950 supply chain and margins
EUR 0.9558 tax and levies
Diesel
EUR 2.0987/L
Final retail price
EUR 0.5297 fuel itself
EUR 0.7034 supply chain and margins
EUR 0.8656 tax and levies
Heating gasoil
EUR 1.6104/L
Final retail price
EUR 0.5297 fuel itself
EUR 0.6761 supply chain and margins
EUR 0.4046 tax and levies
What it shows: crude is only one part of the bill. A large chunk is tax, and another chunk is refining, shipping, storage, and retailing.
Important caveat: the Commission week-of-6-April files still look closer to the old 2c/L NORA rate than the temporary 0.1c/L relief.
Short answer
The short version is simple. In Ireland, road fuel is heavily taxed. Heating oil is taxed less heavily, but it is not tax-free.
In the latest official weekly snapshot, petrol averaged EUR 1.8805/litre and diesel averaged EUR 2.0987/litre. The implied tax-and-levy share was about 95.6c/litre on petrol and 86.6c/litre on diesel.
For home heating oil, the tax share is lower. But a household kerosene order of 1,000 litres at EUR 1,680 including VAT still carries an estimated tax burden of about EUR 362.
Tax on a 50L petrol fill
EUR 47.79
That is roughly how much of a 50-litre petrol fill was tax in the 6 April 2026 snapshot.
Tax on a 50L diesel fill
EUR 43.28
That is roughly how much of a 50-litre diesel fill was tax in the same official file.
Tax on 1,000L heating oil
EUR 361.63
Estimated tax burden on a 1,000-litre household kerosene order at EUR 1,680 including VAT.
1. What the State adds to the price
The State adds fixed charges before you even get to the underlying fuel cost. The biggest ones are Mineral Oil Tax, carbon tax inside that tax, VAT, and the NORA levy.
As of 25 March 2026, Mineral Oil Tax is 58.418c/litre on petrol, 45.315c/litre on diesel, 16.081c/litre on kerosene, and 19.306c/litre on MGO/heavy oil. From 1 April 2026 to 1 June 2026, the NORA levy was temporarily cut from 2.0c/litre to 0.1c/litre.
Chart 1
Current fixed State charges before VAT
The longer the bar, the bigger the fixed Mineral Oil Tax layer before VAT is applied on top of the final sale price.
Carbon tax inside excise
VAT remains 23% on petrol and diesel and 13.5% on heating fuels.
NORA also says the biofuel levy is currently 0.1 euro cent per litre on renewable transport fuels.
2. What a fill-up looks like in practice
AA Ireland's March 2026 breakdown makes the price stack easier to see. On petrol, the tax-heavy part of the litre was bigger than the pre-tax product cost. Diesel showed the same pattern, though less extreme.
VAT matters because it sits on top of the whole price. Every extra 10c/litre added to a pre-VAT road-fuel price generates another 2.3c/litre of VAT. On heating fuel, the same increase generates another 1.35c/litre.
3. What you are paying for besides tax
Even after you strip out tax, you are not just paying for crude oil. You are paying to refine it, ship it, store it, move it across Ireland, and sell it to the customer.
For diesel in particular, refining margins and tight product markets can push prices up sharply even when crude oil itself is not moving one-for-one.
AA Ireland also lists a small Better Energy charge of 0.08c/litre on road fuels. It is small, but it still belongs in the full picture of policy-driven costs.
4. Why Irish fuel feels so expensive
Ireland has very little insulation from world fuel markets. It imported 100% of its oil in 2024, and overall energy import dependency was 79.6%.
Ireland also has one refinery at Whitegate, which can process up to about 75,000 barrels per day. The rest of the country's transport and heating fuel demand must be covered by imported product and feedstock.
Oil imported in 2024
100%
Ireland depended fully on imported oil.
Overall energy import dependency
79.6%
SEAI estimate for 2024.
Whitegate capacity
75,000 bpd
Ireland's only refinery.
Emergency stocks
90 days
Minimum NORA stockholding obligation.
NORA must also maintain emergency stocks equivalent to 90 days. That resilience matters, but it adds cost to the system.
5. Why these taxes stay in place
There is a reason the tax stack survives politically even when people dislike it. Governments defend it as a mix of climate policy, emergency-stock funding, and ordinary state revenue.
Carbon tax is meant to push fuel use down over time and support climate targets.
NORA charges help fund emergency oil stocks so Ireland can keep reserves on hand.
Excise and VAT also flow into general state revenue rather than a single ring-fenced pot.
6. Why many people think the tax stack is too heavy
The strongest criticism is also straightforward. If people still need to drive and heat their homes, a high fuel-tax burden can feel blunt, regressive, and hard to escape.
The tax stack is regressive if households still need to drive and heat their homes anyway.
VAT is charged on top of other charges, so the tax bill rises when the underlying price rises.
Rural households, farmers, hauliers and others with few alternatives feel the burden most.
7. What is different about heating oil
Heating oil is taxed less heavily than road fuel. But it still carries Mineral Oil Tax, the NORA levy, and 13.5% VAT.
Using a cited early-April 2026 market estimate of EUR 1,680 for 1,000 litres, the implied tax-and-levy burden is about EUR 361.63, or about 21.5% of the delivered bill.
For heating gasoil or marine gas oil, the Commission's 6 April 2026 files imply about 40.46c/litre of tax and levies, or roughly 25.1% of the final price.
8. Methodology and caveats
One wrinkle matters here. The Commission's 6 April 2026 “with tax” and “without tax” gap looks more consistent with the old 2c/litre NORA levy than with the temporary €0.001/litre levy that took effect on 1 April 2026.
The safest reading is to use Revenue and gov.ie for the legal rates in force, and to use the Commission bulletin for the broad split between tax and non-tax price.
- The Commission heating-oil series is a proxy. In Ireland the underlying household market is largely kerosene.
- The crude comparator is a rough proxy. It helps show that crude itself is only one part of the litre price, but it is not the value of finished refined fuel.
- The household kerosene example uses a consumer-market national average rather than an official Commission household series.
Bottom line
Petrol in Ireland often carries a tax burden of around half the final pump price. Diesel is usually lower than petrol, but still heavily taxed.
Heating oil carries a lower tax burden than road fuel, but it still adds a meaningful amount to every order. The final price is not just oil. It is oil, refining, logistics, compliance costs, and tax.
Next step
Check your local heating-oil price now.
If you landed here from a broad fuel-price search, the most useful next step is to see what your county is charging for home heating oil today.
References
- European Commission weekly oil bulletin files
- SEAI National Energy Balance
- Revenue Mineral Oil Tax rates
- Revenue VAT rate for petrol
- gov.ie NORA levy reduction announcement
- NORA Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation background
- AA Ireland fuel price breakdown
- gov.ie energy cost measures
- Selectra Ireland home-heating oil guide
- ICE Brent crude futures
- Irving Oil Whitegate overview
- NORA oil stocks