Home Heating Oil: Cheapest Heating Oil for 2024

By Cormac Breen

Content Manager

In December 2024, the average cost of 500 litres of home heating oil in Ireland is €492, while 1000 litres costs €952. In 2024, the average cost of home heating oil per litre is 101.4c. In 2024, the average cost of home heating oil per litre is 101.4c. As a carbon emitting fuel, oil is subject to the Carbon Tax, which adds €141 per 900 litres of oil.

Who Has the Cheapest Home Heating Oil Prices in Ireland?

In December 2024, the cheapest price for home heating oil is in Co.Leitrim at €453 for 500 litres and in Co.Leitrim at €909 for 1,000 litres.

The table below gives an overview of the average price of both 500 and 1,000 litres of home heating oil by county. These prices are averages and may change depending on which supplier you purchase from:

Source: OilPrices.ie

Last updated: December 2024

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Has The Price of Home Heating Oil Increased?

In 2024, the average cost for one litre of home heating oil is 101.4c per litre, which is a slight decrease from the previous year.

The price of home heating almost doubled between 2021 and 2022 rising from 67.7c per litre, to 122.8c per litre before beginning to fall slightly.

As can be seen from the chart below, while prices have fluctuated over the last 15 years, 2022 saw a large spike in prices brought on by the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent energy crisis that gripped Europe, causing home energy costs to skyrocket.

Source: CheapestOil.ie
Last Updated: December 2024

What Is The Average Home Heating Oil Usage per Month?

There are several factors that will influence how much oil you use per month, including:

• The size of your home
• The heating demands of your home
• The efficiency of your boiler
• The time of year

Household heating oil usage varies from around 1300 litres a year in a 3-bedroom house to 2600 litres for a 5-bedroom house.

Per month, this would work out at about 108 litres per month for a 3-bedroom house and about 216 litres per month for a 5-bedroom house, assuming you used your heating every month of the year.

What Are the Pros and Cons of Home Heating Oil

To examine how home heating oil compares to other home heating sources, we start by looking at its pros and cons below.

Pros of Using Oil

• Better Efficiency
  Analysed on its efficiency alone, oil does give a great return on every unit of energy. Oil burns at about 400 degrees hotter than both electricity and natural gas and can warm up your home much faster.
• Often Cheaper
  Provided oil prices are low, oil can be an acceptably priced alternative for your home heating, and is cheaper than heating through electricity-based systems like storage heaters.
• Better in Bulk
  The economy of scale also means that your oil will be cheaper if you buy it in bulk.

Cons of Using Oil

• Possibility of Running Out
  If you haven’t switched to automatic deliveries, as oil is transported by road, there is always the possibility of running out while waiting for your next delivery. Inclement weather such as storms or snow can also affect the routes for supplying oil.
• Storage
  If your house depends on oil for home heating, then you’ll need a place to safely store it, i.e. a tank. You may be able to rent your tank from your supplier, or you might need to buy it outright, adding to the already hefty cost of home heating through oil.
• Yearly Service
  Whichever tank you choose, above ground or underground, it will have to be serviced yearly to ensure there are no issues such as leaks, sludge, or tampering.
• Minimum Purchases
  Many oil companies have a minimum amount of oil that needs to be purchased to make a delivery, many at least 500 litres. This means you can’t simply top your tank up if you’re short on cash and may have to shell out quite a bit.
• Carbon Emissions
  Last but not least, as a fossil fuel, oil does produce carbon when it’s burned for residential use. With Ireland’s commitment to reducing its carbon emissions by increasing the use of renewable energy sources, this is an important negative point.

Where Does Ireland Get Its Home Heating Oil From?

Ireland’s oil, unfortunately, is 100% imported. As so many households are dependent on oil in Ireland, the government maintains roughly 90 days' worth of petroleum stocks for controlled distribution in the event of a shortage.

Oil imports to Ireland consist of petrol, diesel, and crude oil which are then processed at a refinery in Cork. Oil has been discovered off the coast of Cork but has yet to be processed, and with the drive towards renewable energy, it may never be.

Oil imports in Ireland are first received by ship, and then distributed either directly by tanker, or stored in depots. Countries which supply Ireland with oil include:

Source: SEAI - Statistical Overview Report

Are There Alternatives to Heating Your Home With Oil?

There are more and more new technologies coming out to replace the dependency on oil for home heating.

If you’re building a home off the gas grid or already have a home that uses oil, some home heating alternatives you could look into are:

• Connection to the gas network
• Solar panels
• Heat pumps
• Underfloor heating
• Switching to LPG

By having a gas connection, you can avail of discounts and cheap rates by switching gas suppliers.

In particular, installing solar panels or a heat pump might not be as expensive as you think, as they both benefit from substantial grants from the SEAI.