Customs officers have raided an operation that was being run by an individual they believe was the main supplier of black market diesel in Dublin.
"We have cut off his lifeline and taken his product," was how one customs officer described the impact of their raid.
The man is based in west Dublin and is believed to have over 100 customers across Dublin.
Yesterday's operation by the customs enforcement unit based in Dublin, assisted by officers from the Border region, was the culmination of nearly a year of surveillance focusing on this man's operation.
Along with gardaí from Ashbourne, the customs officers raided two adjacent sites between Ashbourne and Kilmoon Cross, where they found around 30,000 litres of green diesel in the process of being put through a filtration system after which it had the appearance of white diesel.
They also found an underground storage tank and an assortment of documentation.
The laundering process, including a pumping system, was being powered by a cable that had been attached to an ESB pole at one end of the site and it was carrying around 20,000 volts.
The man suspected of being behind this operation has been the subject of Garda and customs investigations in the past and up to recent times he was primarily involved in "mixing" green diesel - diluting it with other products and selling it at a considerable profit as white diesel.
It is only in recent weeks that the man has begun laundering diesel. This is seen as a direct response to the pressure he was coming under by customs officers investigating his role in selling so-called mixed or "stretched" diesel.
Green or agricultural diesel is cheaper to buy because of the lower excise duties incurred. It is bought in bulk and then treated to remove the colour so that it can be sold as white diesel at a much greater retail price and a correspondingly greater loss to the Exchequer.
Sources believe that this man had a turnover of around half a million litres of diesel last year, which amounted to a potential loss to the Exchequer of around €1.5 million.