Australian Households feeling transport costs, electric vehicles could save thousands
6th September 2022: Australian Households feeling transport costs, electric vehicles could save thousands
Released today, the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ Monthly Household Spending Indicator shows that in July, spending related to transport was a record high at an increase of 35.4%. Solar Citizens have today released an Electric Vehicle Savings Calculator, showing how much households could save by switching to electric vehicles.
“Australian households are feeling the pain of soaring petrol prices acutely, yet we could have avoided this if we had secured a stronger supply of affordable electric vehicles years ago”, said Ajaya Haikerwal, Clean Transport Campaigner at Solar Citizens.
“When we recently surveyed over 1,700 of our supporters, the vast majority told us that they are very concerned about how rising petrol prices are impacting their cost of living, and 64% are interested in purchasing an electric vehicle sometime in the next three years,” said Haikerwal.
Solar Citizens has developed an Electric Vehicle Savings Calculator, to help consumers find out how much cheaper it is to run cars through home solar or the electricity grid than it is to run an equivalent petrol car.
As an example, Risyad Abmar, a 27 year old nurse from Melbourne is currently paying an extra $200 each month on petrol. He calculated that if he switched from a Kia Sportage to an equivalent Kia EV6, he could expect to save nearly $20 for every 100km – over $2,000 in a single year of driving.
“Household transport costs have ballooned since April this year, and people are really feeling the strain. Today’s ABS data tells us that unless we can help Aussies make the switch to an EV, transport costs will continue to drain our wallets and bank accounts, and line the pockets of Russian oil barons.
“Petrol prices have rocketed sky-high since the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Everyday Australians are paying the price for our dependence on a volatile international fuel supply, whereas if we had EVs—especially those charged on home solar—we wouldn’t be dangerously vulnerable to foreign oil prices and availability.
“We have the biggest uptake of solar energy per capita in the world, and running electric cars via home solar is a no brainer, and can be up to 98% cheaper than paying petrol prices.
“We made a tool that will help anyone see the facts and figures about why making the switch to an EV would really help their hip pockets in the long term.
“Our calculator demonstrates that if Australians could get their hands on EVs, they could slash their transport costs by hundreds of dollars each year by utilising grid energy, or even better – using the sunshine hitting their solar panels on their own roofs.
“Because of the stalling of successive Federal Governments and sabotage from the petrol car lobby, we are yet to see our fair share of affordable EVs in the Australian market. We need globally competitive Fuel Efficiency Standards within the next year to ensure we have our place in the global queue.
Fuel Efficiency Standards are widely regarded as the key policy measure to securing a supply of EVs in Australia. We are one of four G20 countries not to have implemented this policy.
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Media Contact: Ajaya Haikerwal (0400 723 324)
