Electric car grant to be cut by €1,500 from July

The maximum private car grant to purchase an electric vehicle is to be cut by €1,500, the Department of Transport today confirmed.

From 1st July this year, the maximum car grant will be set at €3,500, down from the current maximum of €5,000.

Ireland has a buoyant demand for electric vehicles and there was an 81 per cent increase in registration of EVs last year compared to the previous year, recent CSO figures show.

As of end December 2022, there were 73,574 electric vehicles on Irish roads.

Administered by the Sustainable Authority of Ireland (SEAI), the grant has been in operation since 2011, and is said to have supported the purchase of over 40,000 electric vehicles in that time.

Zero Emission Vehicles Ireland (ZEVI), an office within the Department of Transport, said that many other elements of the EV grant system remain unchanged.

Vehicle incentives for business stay the same and SEAI will continue to administer the commercially bought EVs and large panel vans grants at current levels.

The small public service vehicles (SPSV) grant for taxi and hackney drivers administered by the NTA was renewed in February, while the Alternatively Fuelled Heavy Duty Vehicle Purchase Grant Scheme, managed by Transport Infrastructure Ireland, has also remained unchanged.

In addition, there is no change to the existing VRT relief which is available to a maximum of €5,000 to purchasers of electric vehicles up to the selling price of €40,000, with a reduced scale for vehicles up to the selling price of €50,000.