Over the last few weeks the price of fuel in Ireland has risen. As it has in a number of places.

There is a suggestion that Europe has about six weeks of surplus aviation fuel and that perhaps, the summer travel season should be put on hold for 2026. Or at least that part of the season that involves flying here and there. That would be a lot of airmiles. In 2023, from May to September, there were around 973 million air passengers. 2024 saw 1.1 billion for the same period.

A lot of people flying. A lot of airmiles. A lot of avaiation fuel. Reduced suppliy will drive up prices. This is inevitable.

The current situation has been created and exacserbated by the American attacks on Iran and Isreals on going attacks on Palestine and Lebanon. Isreal first bombed Palestine in 1948, with Lebabon being bombed in 1982.

Ireland, wth it’s huge reliance on fossil fuels and that it is, lierally at the end of the pipeline, often sees that quickest and sharpest fuel cost rises. Almost half of the cost of fuel in Ireland is government duty; tax.

This makes a lot of people very angry and is seen, widely, as a bad thing. Consequently, there has been a self appointed fuel militia who have started to blockade large parts of the major road network; motorways, main roads and town and city centres.

The ire of the masses, in this case, heavily subsidised farmers, is, as ever, misplaced. Their objective seems to be a relatively short term reduction in fuel duty, oil duty. 5 cents, 10 cents off the current litre price of fuel, home heating oil, etc.

They are really quite angry. They have dumped their tractors on the motorway. Road Hauliers have joined them. The police and the government are watching intently. Not being active, but certainly actively watching.

The problem is, they, farmers, lorry drivers, delivery people, the menaces of the roads, are really quite angry about the wrong things.

What they should be angry about is the utter lack of any level of planning to transition away from carbon heavy, polluting, expensive fossil fuels to clean, reliable, energy independent renewable energy creation : solar, wind, geo’ thermal, tidal ….. There are others. France generates around 65% of it’s electricity from nuclear. That is part of the acceptable energy mix that does not have to include fossil.

For 2025, the average renewable energy creation, not including nuclear, was around 50%. This is the average. For an average, there must be higher.

Denmark, Austria, Portugal, Croatia, Latvia, Sweden, Lithuania, Estonia are all above 60%. Luxembourg, Finland, Germany and Spain are all knocking on the door of 60%. France is a little below average, however is exceptional if nuclear /is/ included. THe UK tips the scales at 65 to 70%, Switzerland 60 to 65%. The UK includes nuclear, the Swiss multi task on the mountasins generating as large amount of hydro’ power.

What does Europe then do with all this lovely renewably generated electricity ? For the large parts Europe has excellent public transport. Which runs on renewable electricity. As I write this I am on the Zurich Airport to Bern train; two levels, very long, smooth, quiet, efficient. And clean. And quiet. And 100% renewable electricity

Scandinavia, Norway in particular, had in 2025, almost 90% of all car sales as battery electric cars. Cheap, clean, renewable electricity with more charging access points than there are Starbucks. Terrible coffee, but they are ubiquitous.

Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, others, prioritise mobility by public transport. Interconnected international, national, regional, local public transports networks. People expect public transport to work. So it is used. Because it is used, there is investment and therefore continuous improvement. The more it is used, the better it gets. The better it is, the more it is used.

And then we have Ireland. Dublin has two tram lines. One North South, the other West to Centre. There is no East. Electric trams. Bombardier. Brown and silver. Trams. That is pretty much where it ends. 97% of buses are diesel. Noisy, dirty, polluting. There are some electric buses coming on line at some point, but, the chances of being carried by diesel are high. The entire national rail network is also diesel. The Belfast to Dublin line are buying some new trains; they will be electric. You won’t be able to bring a bike on board, but that is a different topic. They will come on line sometime around 2035. 

Ireland has a valiant 40% of energy coming from renewable sources. Which, looked at another way, 60% of everything that Ireland consumes is polluting, dirty, imported carbon heavy fossil fuel. Gas. Oil. Oil becomes diesel, petrol, home heating oil and other things.

Ireland is also guilty of burning peat. Peat is, by any measure, the single worst non renewable, carbon heavy source of energy there is. The EU banned the burning of peat in 2022. Ireland has ignored it and continues to dig and burn peat at alarming rates. Ireland is literally burning it’s own land.

Ireland is also debating with itself about creating a new LNG Port on the west coast. Ireland currently imports natural gas primarily via pipelines from the UK, with no operational LNG terminals yet.

The proposed Shannon LNG terminal on the west coast aims to diversify gas supply by enabling LNG imports via ship, enhancing energy security and flexibility. This terminal would include a port and re-gasification facilities to convert LNG back to gas for the national grid.

Projected costs for the Shannon LNG project are estimated around €600-700 million, This would build a huge amount of additnal wind, hydro and solar capacity.

This €600-700 million will become a money pit that will tie the Irish economy to a carbon heavy future, will drive up energy prices and therefore the cost of living and will, year on year, decade on decade, reduce personal disposable income to level so low as to perplexed a field mouse.

And so I return to the grumpy farmers who are blocking the streets of Dublin with their diesel tractors. Hauliers dumping the diesel fumes from their running, but stationary engines in to the side streets. Both groups unaware of , or too stupid to see, the irony.

They are demand, and will probably get, a short term, temporary reduction in fuel cost. Either by simply reducing tax for a while or by the government injecting some money into the wholesale markets and buying directly and passing on, for a short period, the wholesale cost without markup.

Moreover, when that initiative expires, when the small pot of money runs out, Ireland will be back to where it is now and where it will continue to be be for decades to come : tied to the frivolities of the wholesale, international energy markets which in turn is tied to everything that happens everywhere else. Ireland is and will continue to be powerless. It will continue to at the mercy of the energy markets and will have less and less influence over how those markets are run, are controlled and where the profits will land. They will not be landing in Ireland.

Ireland has around 750 kms of west coast it calls the Wild Atlantic Way. It is wild because it is /windy/. There is a clue here. Almost one thousand kilometres were land meets sea. Where the waves crash in. Which have been wind swept for millennia. There is also free available land which is not coast line, which could house wind turbines. A lot of that land is currently being dug up, dried and set fire too. Putting wind turbines in and stopping the digging up and burning of land would be a win win. For everybody.

Focusing on the tax take on carbon fuels misses the point. The question is, what is done with that tax take?  In Scandinavia, in Germany, in the Benelux region. In Switzerland, it is clear. In Ireland it is less clear. Some of the highest individual tax rates in Europe, some of the worst infrastructure combined with almost no state health care.

As an average income person, Ireland has the sixth highest percentage tax rate in Europe at 48%. Only three Scandic countries, Finland, Denmark and Sweden, with Belgium and the Netherlands having a higher rate. Nobody has less infrastructure than Ireland.

Ireland does have the lowest Corporation tax in the EU.

High personal tax, no infrastructure. Low Corporate tax rate. This to me feels like the wrong way around. To the two party political system who have run the country since it was carved out of the UK, clearly they are happy with it.

One wonders if that will continue.