Driving An EV Now Costs Half As Much As Diesel, New Analysis Shows

Support CleanTechnica’s work through a Substack subscription, on Patreon, or on Stripe. Help us produce all of the high-quality, original content we publish week after week despite the challenges of content-scraping AI, antisocial media, inflation, and other hurdles.

Diesel drivers in Europe are paying €32 more at the pump than at the beginning of the war in Iran. As Europe’s leaders meet in Brussels to discuss how to tackle the energy crisis, the case for EVs has never been clearer, says T&E.

EV drivers are paying, on average, less than half of what diesel drivers are paying for every kilometre, new data analysed by T&E shows¹. Europe must accelerate its transition to electric vehicles and resist blanket fuel duty cuts, according to T&E. Instead, it recommends targeted support for low-income households, alongside energy firm windfall taxes to fund public transport and scrappage schemes.

Antony Froggatt, senior director at T&E: “We are at a critical moment in the diesel crisis. Prices are already sky high for citizens and businesses and if the US blocks exports of diesel, there is a real risk of a genuine shortage of supply. This would be crippling. Electrification is the only way to ensure this is the last oil crisis. But we need short-term measures as well. The EU should tax oil profits and use it to support low-income households and fund scrappage schemes.”

Latest data shows that diesel drivers are paying €32 more per tank than at the start of the year, and around €16 of that is extra refinery margin.² As refinery margins have grown, so have oil company profits. Previous T&E analysis shows that oil companies have doubled their total oil profits in Europe in the last quarter.

A big chunk of Europe’s diesel goes to its trucks and vans. A study published by T&E on Monday shows that electric trucks are cheaper to operate than diesel for almost half of trucks sold in the EU. This comes as European truckmaker CEOs are calling for delays to emissions targets which would cut the sales of e-trucks by half.

EU energy chief Dan Jørgensen wrote to national capitals asking them to consider putting in force energy-saving measures, in response to potentially high gas prices. The EU Commission should not just focus on gas, says T&E, with oil and diesel representing the sharp end of the crisis, says T&E.

News release from T&E.

¹ Refuelling/recharging costs only. Based on average consumption of 6.9 L/100 km (diesel) and 20.2 kWh/100 km (battery electric), and an electricity price of €0.343/kWh, T&E’s estimate of charging costs, which accounts for the correlation between electricity and gas prices and its lagged pass-through to households, is likely an upper bound.

² 50-litre tank. Pump price: EU-27 weighted average diesel price including taxes (EC Weekly Oil Bulletin, 21 September 2026), compared with the February 2026 average. Refinery margin: ECB estimates, up from about €0.10/L in February to €0.41/L around 14 September 2026 (ECB, 2026; Euronews, 19 September 2026). The margin figure is a week older than the pump price, but the diesel crack stayed broadly stable between the two dates.