Federal energy and climate minister says Australia’s fleet of electric vehicles may be small – at least in global standards – but it is still saving 15 million litres of fuel per week.

Bowen made the observation while holding a press conference to discuss the spectacular fire at the Viva Energy refinery at Corio, near Geelong in Victoria, which will inevitably lead to lost production at the facility, at least in the short term.

He said the uptake of EVs – which hit a record high of 14.5 per cent of new car sales in March, partly as a response to the global fuel crisis – is helping reduce demand pressure.

“Our EV uptake in Australia, our number of EVs in the fleet is relatively low at the moment, high in sales terms but low as a percentage of the fleet,” he said.

“It takes a long time. Even with the relatively low EV uptake we have, that’s avoiding the use of 15 million litres a week of fuel. That’s a good thing. That’s 15 million litres we have available for others. That’s part of it.

“Now, if we have higher EV sales and higher EV penetration and higher EV percentages across the entire fleet, that figure will come down even more and provide more fuel options for those for whom an EV is not a viable option just right now.”

There are an estimated 410,000 EVs in Australia – making up less than 2 per cent of the total car fleet of around 22 million. Bowen’s calculations of 15 million litres saved per week works out to about 36 litres per vehicle, which sounds about right.

(In Norway, where EVs represent some 98 per cent of new car sales, total EV numbers have reached more than one million, and 30 per cent of the total car fleet. Interestingly, in the last month, total EVs sales jumped 66 per cent as many owners of ICE cars judged it to be a good time to finally go electric).

Bowen had been asked whether the fossil fuel crisis caused by developments in the Middle East should lead to an expansion of fossil fuel production.

“Well, no, because what I’m talking about there is the immediate challenge. And then there are some who say the answer to this is to somehow become more reliant on fossil fuels. That’s not a view I share. It’s not a view that any ministerial counterpart around the world I’ve spoken to shares,” Bowen said.

“We are dealing with a short-term issue, yes, of supply. There’s been a fossil fuel supply shock. This is a fossil fuel supply crisis internationally. The answer to that is sensible measures like the ones we’re undertaking, the Prime Minister’s undertaking.

“And in the longer term, if you can reduce to some degree, or a greater degree, our dependence on those fossil fuels, that’s a good thing.

“This underlines and underpins one of the reasons why we’re electrifying and trying to get more sovereign sources of renewable energy, so we are less reliant on these fragile fossil fuel supply chains.”

Giles Parkinson is founder and editor of The Driven, and also edits and founded the Renew Economy and One Step Off The Grid web sites. He has been a journalist for nearly 40 years, is a former business and deputy editor of the Australian Financial Review, and owns a Tesla Model 3.