Norway was the first country to sell more electric cars than gasoline, hybrid and diesel engines last year. New data shows that in the last months of 2020 two thirds of sales were generated with battery electric vehicles (BEV).
Norway has one of the world’s most ambitious green goals and plans to end sales of all new fossil fuel vehicles by 2025, five years earlier than the UK.
It is quite a contradiction in a country that has become one of the richest in the world due to its oil and gas revenues, has made itself dependent on oil and continues to produce, even as the world increasingly rejects fossil fuels from zero emissions.
While the government is auctioning oil exploration licenses for fields in the fragile Arctic on the one hand, it is also aiming for a climate-neutral national vehicle fleet by 2030. On Friday, she presented her national climate plan, which included an ambitious target and a promise that the public sector will only have to procure zero-emission vehicles from next year.
While Norway is still one of the largest oil producers in the world, it gets more than 90% of its electricity from hydroelectric sources. In a way, this explains why the introduction of electric vehicles has been so successful: as long as the rivers and waterfalls don’t run dry, it’s an infinite source of energy that can also be applied to vehicles. Even in the north, where the distances between the settlements are great and the winter extreme is extreme, the electric car is gaining a stronghold.
Christina Bu, Head of the Norwegian Association for Electric Vehicles, said: “Last autumn we saw a market share increase of up to 40% in the northernmost counties of Norway, Troms and Finnmark.”
There is a long-term political strategy behind the success, she said. “One might assume that this is about subsidies. It is not. It’s about taxing what we don’t want and promoting what we want. “
Greenpeace activists climb an oil rig in a fjord off the west coast of Norway in 2018. The country is one of the largest oil producers in the world. Photo: Reuters
Norway has some of the highest taxes in the world on luxury goods, including cars. Reduced taxes on vehicles with numerous incentives will therefore attract car buyers. There are a number of incentives and exemptions, including:
• No car purchase tax (a high levy that helps raise the average price of a vehicle in Norway to £ 43,000 to £ 46,000, compared to an EU average of £ 26,000 to £ 29,000).
• No VAT – usually 25%
• No road tax
• Free parking in some municipal car parks
• Reduced tax on company electric cars (at a lower rate than fossil fuel vehicles)
• Reduced or free tolls in some areas
• Driving in a bus lane when carrying a passenger
• 50% discount on some parking spaces, tolls and ferry tariffs
The ambitious political strategy dates back to the late 1990s when it was introduced to boost production of Norwegian electric cars and reduce emissions.
It didn’t quite work out that way. BEVs produced in Norway are still noticeable in their absence, to the delight of foreign car manufacturers. However, the number of electric cars sold has increased from 3% of total sales in 2012 to 54% in 2020. There are 2.8 million vehicles on Norway’s roads and more than 260,000 are fully electric, which is almost 9% of the total number of vehicles. Nearly 40 new BEV models will hit the market in Norway next year, more than the number of fossil fuel and hybrid models.
“Norway has certainly paved the way for the industry,” said Per Espen Stoknes, Green MP, TED global spokesperson and assistant professor at BI Norwegian Business School, and psychologist whose latest book will be published, The Psychology of Climate Change.
Stoknes described the process of expanding the national BEV park as “a green tax shift” that any country could afford if they focused on the right things. As a psychologist, he also emphasized the power of social pressure, especially in densely populated cities.
“We were able to show statistically that there is an effect in keeping up with the Joneses. This means that if someone buys a BEV on a street, the neighbors are more likely to follow suit. It can become a competition where, as always, envy is a powerful driving force. “
As in the UK, the big challenge is installing charging stations across the country. There are now 3,200 fast charging stations operated by around 10 companies who are working on developing ever faster chargers. Issues still remain, especially on the busiest days of travel as BEV drivers face long lines and out-of-service chargers. Bu said, “We must constantly encourage the development of more and more reliable chargers.”
The more electric cars are sold, the harder it is for critics to be heard. Although BEVs are environmentally friendly in the local context, they still leave a large climatic footprint worldwide. The manufacture of BEV batteries requires expensive and rare metals, while the safe disposal of used and defective batteries is a problem. Both concerns conveniently relate to poor, vulnerable countries – like the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which produces 60% of the world’s cobalt – that lack the legislation to deal with them.