Electric Vehicles are now Ireland's most popular model for new cars, with EVs now twice as popular as diesel cars. 

According to new data released by the CSO, 26% of cars sold in Ireland last month were EVs, while 24.6% were petrol hybrids, 20.4% were petrol cars, 14.5 per cent were plug-in hybrids and a mere 12.5% were diesels.

On The Claire Byrne Show, motoring expert Paddy Comyn said the figures were a “while coming” and that the fuel crisis had generated a “huge spike” in interest in EVs.

Last month, 9,600 new EVs were registered, which he describes as a “really big growth” on previous years. 

However, he cautioned that it is still mainly urban people who are buying them. 

“It's not surprising that Dublin and Cork accounted for almost half of all private electric vehicles on Irish roads - that was according to the CSO figures,” he said. 

“The main urban centres, Kildare, Meath, Wicklow, Galway, made up 70% of the national EV stock alongside Dublin and Cork.”

However, despite the upward growth, Mr Comyn warned that Ireland is “still a fair bit behind some of our European neighbours”. 

“If you consider we're now about 26% of the new car market is now EVs,” he said. 

“Norway's at 99%, Denmark’s at 80%, Finland at 49%. 

“Those countries in particular have been really forward facing in terms of penalising petrol and diesel cars.

“Now, I wouldn't advocate for that, but it did work - and then they had the heavy incentives on the EVs.”

An EV being charged. Picture by: Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call/Sipa USA. 

In total, a mere 4% of the Irish national fleet are EVs, so it is “going to take probably a generation to catch up even to those countries”. 

“It'll be some time to come before we'll see 100% EVs and sadly, probably not in your and my lifetime,” he said. 

“We would expect to see that growth continue because manufacturers in particular just are producing fewer petrol and diesel only cars. 

“We won't see those disappearing anytime soon, but we will see a proliferation of new electric vehicles coming online.

“We've seen a lot of new cheaper entrants to the market; there's several cars you can get now that are under €20,000 for a new car - those are all EVs.”

However, the surge in new EVs means they will eventually trickle down into the second hand market. 

“The used market is developing,” Mr Comyn said. 

“We would have about 6,5000 new and used EVs at any given time.

“So, it is still a small enough percentage of the market, but it is growing in terms of new vehicles.

“The supply is great and you'll see more and more of that - there's such a big choice now.”

Main image: An EV recharging in Dublin. Picture by: Alamy.com.