In 2020 & 2024 I drove around the island - Wexford to Belfast to Letterkenny to Killarney to Wexford (or the other way around), both times with a Model 3 Long Range AWD. This time it would be with a Model 3 Long Range RWD.
Summary
The tl;dr is: driving 1,171km; driving for 13hrs 57mins; charging for only 33mins; costing only €62.09 - around half the cost of petrol / diesel / hybrid.
The Car Differences
With a 6 year gap between Model 3s, it's worth noting some key differences (or not) between the vehicles used.
| Specifications |
2020 Model 3 Long Range AWD |
2026 Model 3 Long Range RWD |
| Battery (Useable) | 73.5kWh | 79.0kWh |
| Range (WLTP) | 560km | 750km |
| Rated Consumption (WLTP) | 160Wh/km | 126Wh/km |
| Maximum Charging Capability | 250kW | 250kW |
| Autopilot Hardware Version | 3 | 4 |
| Motors | Dual | Single |
| Heat Pump | No | Yes |
A full comparison can be found at EVDB. Just for clarity, these are not the same vehicles separated by six years of developments - the former's all-wheel drive, the latter rear-wheel drive.
Route & Charging Planning
As before, the basic route is Wexford to Belfast to Letterkenny to Killarney to Wexford... or the other way around. Estimated travel time varied by start time, though typically +/-14hrs, with the majority of the roads would be national primary roads & motorways. So, the choice is go West & around, or go North & around. I'd decide on that closer to departure.
As stated in our New EV Owner’s Guide & Going The Distance webinar, "80% the WLTP Combined Cycle provides a more realistic range... become accustomed to what your actual typical achievable range is”. That pointed to a 600km realistic range before I'd need charge. Sligo was closest to that distance (going either direction), so the new Tesla Supercharger at Davis's Restaurant & Yeats Tavern in Drumcliffe seemed the ideal first charging location.
That's the extent of advance charging planning, I'd think about it more wherever I first plug in, aware that I'd've other options if I needed charge sooner.
The Drive: Stage 1
I decided Saturday to go on Sunday, & with Fleadh Cheoil na hÉireann on in Belfast & over a million visitors having been reported I figured it would be best to get through Northern Ireland early... so North & around it was.
I headed off around 4am after charging to 100% had completed, & was on the M1 in Belfast passing under RISE little after 7am. While it'd been raining an hour now, at least I'd now put the potential Fleadh traffic behind me. However, as I left the A6 behind, & crossed into county Donegal slow travel ensued anyway as the single-lane roads were subject to the most cautious of drivers.
Regardless, a little after 10am I arrived at Davis's Restaurant & Yeats Tavern Supercharger (8 250kW CCS stalls), battery's state of charge now down to 9%. The trip meter reported 563km, 127Wh/km for this stage of the drive. Worth noting at this point that the trip meter only reports energy consumed while the vehicle is in drive, i.e. energy used while not in drive, & charging losses are omitted.
Supercharging peaked at 234kW. Initially estimating 55mins to charge to 100% I considered just doing it with this one charge session - I was essentially halfway around at this point after all.
I quickly dismissed that idea as it would be quicker still to charge somewhere else. With Killarney almost 350km away I figured I'd charge closer to Limerick... more options. By now I'd been charging 15mins & the car was charged back up around 60% so off I went.
The Drive: Stage 2
The cautious driving continued from Drumcliffe to Tuam, as did rain of varying intensity. However, with the rain finally ceased (which'd been ongoing around 6hrs at this point) & having just joined the M17 at Tuam I was once more able to drive at the speed limit for a prolonged period of time.
Ennis, Bunratty, & Newcastle West were all the navigation, which estimated the battery's state of charge for each. I'd be into low battery territory (<= 20%) by The Banner Plaza (Ennis), but not that low; Bunratty was lower still, but occupancy seemed high, so decided skip Bunratty Castle Hotel & go for Applegreen Clondrinagh which were all available.
Arrived at Applegreen Clondrinagh near 1pm...
.. & having taken that photo while it was going through the connection process with the charger, it failed; tried another unit, failed again. As I said earlier, I like having options, so rather than waste any more time on figuring out the problem I just reported the faults in-app & got back onto the N18 to go to Newcastle West (subsequently checking at home revealed a dated payment method was most likely the issue).
Less than an hour later, with navigation directing me around Adare for whatever reason, I arrived at Dooley's SuperValu Newcastle West, whose EZO high power chargers (2 dual CCS 200kW units) had only been activated a month beforehand. The trip meter reported 280km, 132Wh/km for this stage of the drive.
Charging peaked at 178kW. Navigation was set for home (via Killarney & Cork City) around 330km away now, & having now charged 15mins a positive value was being reported for battery's state of charge... so I left it continue & unplugged 3mins later. Estimated state of charge on arrival home was now 10%.
The Drive: Stage 3
Another navigation redirect prior to Farranfore, for whatever reason, which saved a few minutes - I could now join the heavy traffic on the Killarney Bypass all the sooner. That aside, all good on the N22 outside Killarney, & the Cork South Ring Road proved free flowing.
Now in Dungarvan with only 100km to go, & with that estimated state of charge on arrival still holding up, I stopped for another quick break at Garvey's Centra, though didn't charge.
So, several minutes later, drove off for the last time, arriving home at 6:30pm at 11% state of charge. The trip meter reported 326km, 103Wh/km for this stage of the drive.
The Drive: Summary
Tesla's trip meter provides the following summary of the day's driving.
Driving time was within Apple Maps estimated range of travel time, & much the same as the prior drives, so fine enough with me. Energy use for the entire drive amounted to 142.3kWh, averaging 121.5Wh/km.
More impressively, charging time amounted to only 33mins - that's 41mins less than in 2024, & 1hr 12mins less than in 2020. This is the result of a combination of great efficiency & a high initial range which effectively covered 50% of the total distance. That therefore reduced the kWh that would be required off public charging, along with an increased availability of high power charging along the route.
This meant an overall drive plus charging time of 14hrs 30mins.
The Drive: Costs
To calculate costs I used what energy Tesla & EZO billed for (which includes charging losses), along with a 100% home charge (assuming 5% losses thereon) which I charged up to over several nights.
| Location | kWh | Cost |
| Home | 83.2 | €7.84 (Energia EV Smart Drive, 2am - 6am, €0.0942/kWh) |
| Drumcliffe (Tesla) | 38.9 | €22.17 (9am - 8pm, €0.57/kWh)* |
| Newcastle West (EZO) | 43.0 | €32.08 (€0.27/Access + €0.74/kWh) |
| Total | 165.1 | €62.09 |
* While I've included Tesla's normal pricing here, free supercharging credit was available to me, so the price actually paid at Drumcliffe was €0.
So how's that compare to petrol or diesel? AA Ireland's August Fuel Price Survey reports petrol €1.84/l, & Diesel €1.92/l, which equates to:
| Fuel Consumption (l/100km) | Petrol | Diesel |
| 4 | €86.19 | €89.93 |
| 5 | €107.73 | €112.42 |
| 6 | €129.28 | €134.90 |
| 7 | €150.82 | €157.38 |
With many a comparable petrol / diesel / hybrid's consumption in the range of 5 - 6l/100km this indicates electric was around 50% less expensive than the fuel alternative (€62.09 v. €107.73 - €134.90). This reflects the cost benefit high range plus off-peak home charging enables (covering 50% of the journey), & great efficiency, which helps minimise what energy you do actually need to keep going.
We're now at a point where even a near 1,200km journey can be significantly less expensive with electric. For comparison, in 2024 a lesser proportion of the journey, 30%, was covered by the initial home charge, & cost parity was seen at 5l/100km.
2024 to 2026: Infrastructure Changes
I'd finished up last time by mentioning the charging network plans / schemes that'd recently launched, or were to come. A cursory check of PlugShare along the route reveals the following as having gone live since that 2024 drive within 2km of the route, a good number of which are indeed the result of those schemes:
Again, that's just the more notable new ones along the route - there's certainly more.
Conclusion
This latest Big Drive highlights a number of things to me.
First, the improvements in vehicle range & efficiency, & an increasing number of vehicles are now available with 700km+ WLTP rated ranges.
Second, following on from that, the savings that such vehicles can enable even on long distance journeys (again, assuming you've access to off-peak home charging). We're now at a point where even a near 1,200km journey can be significantly less expensive with electric.
Finally, of course, the continued improvements to charging infrastructure, both in terms of speed & availability. As illustrated in Limerick, I'd a range of charging options, could handily dismiss them & if things go wrong (which it did), just go elsewhere.
Again to recap the day: driving 1,171km; driving for 13hrs 57mins; charging for only 33mins; costing only €62.09 - around half the cost of petrol / diesel / hybrid.