David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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399. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the estimated full-year cost of increasing the grant for each category of electric vehicle by €1,000, €1,500 and €2,000 assuming an increase in uptake of vehicles. [38672/19]

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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426. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the estimated cost of increasing the grant for each category of electric vehicle by €1,000, €1,500 and €2,000. [38635/19]

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 399 and 426 together.

The electric vehicle purchase grant, introduced in April 2011, provides grant aid of up to €5,000 towards the purchase of a new battery electric vehicle or new plug-in hybrid electric vehicle. From the introduction of the scheme to the end of August 2019, grant support has been provided for the purchase of a total of over 8,000 new vehicles to the value of €37 million. To date this year, over €15 million has been provided to support the purchase of 3,422 new electric vehicles. My Department estimates that the number of new electric vehicles which will receive support this year under the EV purchase will be circa 4,500 to 5,000.

The electric vehicle purchase grant is demand led and it is therefore difficult to predict exactly how many vehicles will be purchased in future years. However, the trend over the last number of years shows increasing numbers of new electric vehicles purchased year on year.

Based on supporting 9,000 electric vehicles next year through the purchase grant in 2020, the table below shows the increased cost if the amount paid were increased by €1,000, €1,500 and €2,000.