Irish farmers drew 13 million fewer litres of green diesel from bonded warehouses in the first six months of 2026, a 2% drop on the same period in 2025. The figure comes from the Central Statistics Office (CSO), whose excise clearance data serves as the closest available proxy for actual fuel sales.

The monthly picture is more mixed than the half-year trend suggests. Marked gas oil clearances stood at 107 million litres in June 2026, up from 102 million litres in June 2025. That single-month rise sits inside a rolling 12-month period — July 2025 to June 2026 — in which clearances declined by 1% compared with July 2024 to June 2025.

What do the numbers actually measure?

Clearances record the excise duty paid on oil leaving bonded warehouses, not fuel burned at the farm gate. The distinction matters. A clearance drop can reflect genuine cuts in usage, but it can also reflect stockholding behaviour, timing of bulk purchases, or shifts in how merchants move product.

Even so, the direction of travel is consistent across the entire fuel basket, and that consistency is what makes the release worth a farmer's attention.

How did the other fuels perform?

CSO statistician Dr. Robert Stapleton, who works in the climate and energy division, set out the broader picture:

• Kerosene: clearances fell 11% in the first six months of 2026 versus the same period in 2025; down 6% on a 12-month rolling basis — a drop of roughly 55 million litres.
• Autodiesel: clearances down 3% in the 12-month period July 2025 to June 2026, equivalent to around 96 million litres.
• Unleaded petrol: the one gainer, up 6% over the same rolling period, an increase of about 65 million litres.
• Marked gas oil (green diesel): down 2% in the first half of 2026, a reduction of around 13 million litres.

"Kerosene clearances were 11% lower in the first six months of 2026 compared with the same period in 2025," Dr. Stapleton said.

He added: "Marked gas oil clearances declined by 2% in the first six months of 2026 compared with the same period in 2025, a reduction of around 13 million litres."

Why does this matter for farm budgets?

Green diesel remains the workhorse fuel for Irish tractors, telehandlers and yard machinery, so clearance trends feed directly into discussions about farm energy costs and consumption. A 13 million litre reduction across six months points to either lower machinery hours, greater efficiency, or a shift in purchasing patterns — and possibly some switching between fuel types, hinted at by the petrol increase alongside the autodiesel decline.

The kerosene figure carries its own weight for farm households and rural homes, where heating oil remains the default. A 55 million litre annual fall in kerosene clearances is the largest absolute decline in the release after autodiesel's 96 million litres.

Farmers tracking fuel costs should watch the next CSO release for whether the June uptick in marked gas oil clearances — 107 million litres against 102 million a year earlier — marks the start of a recovery in demand or simply a timing effect in bulk buying ahead of the harvest and silage seasons.