Norway powers ahead

04/01/2018

Norway powers ahead

Reuters reports that in 2017 Norway saw sales of electric and hybrid vehicles rose above half of new registrations.

Generous governmental subsidies saw EV and hybrid cars account for 52% of all new car sales last year, as opposed to 40% in 2016, the Norwegian Road Federation (OFV) reported.

'No one else is close' in terms of a national share of electric cars, OFV chief Oeyvind Solberg Thorsen said. 'For the first time we have a fossil-fuel market share below 50%.'

The rise in market share is likely to have come from the fact that Norway exempts new electric cars from almost all taxes and some attractive grants which can be worth thousands of dollars a year.

Almost all Norway's electricity comes from hydropower, allowing a reduction in air pollution and climate change.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) said Norway was far ahead of other nations such as the Netherlands, Sweden, China, France and Britain in electric car sales.

By the IEA yardstick, which excludes hybrid cars with only a small electric motor that cannot be plugged in, electric car sales in Norway rose to 39% in 2017 from 29% in 2016, when the Netherlands was in second on 6.4%.

'We view Norway as a role model for how electric mobility can be promoted through smart incentives,' a spokesman at BMW's Munich HQ said. 'The situation would probably be different if these incentives were dropped.'

Other 'good examples' of policies to spur electric-car demand include Britain, California and the Netherlands, he said.

Norway's goal is to see all cars sold with zero emissions by 2025. France and Britain aim to ban petrol and diesel car sales by 2040.

Christina Bu, head of the Norwegian Electric Vehicle Association which represents owners, said the 2025 goal meant that Norway should stick with its incentives for electric cars.

'It's an ambitious goal only seven years away,' she told Reuters. Overall, sales of zero emissions cars in Norway rose in 2017 to 21% from 16% in 2016.