Summary
Norway leads the world in electric vehicle (EV) adoption, with EVs making up nearly 90% of new car sales in 2024 and over 30% of all cars on its roads.
This shift, driven by decades of policies like tax exemptions for EVs, higher taxes on fossil fuel cars, and perks like free parking, has put Norway on track to phase out new fossil fuel car sales by 2025.
The country’s wealth, renewable hydroelectric power, and extensive charging network have enabled its EV revolution, serving as a model for other nations.
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Amazing how easily it’s happened with barely any effort. We could have fixed climate change 50 years ago but the fossil fuel industry wanted their money so now the earth is fucked
To be absolutely clear, Norway has achieved this by selling oil to other countries. This wasn’t a heroic sacrifice or noble vanguard effort.
The ability to pay for subsidies has no relation to the source of the funds. What matters is GDP, overall national wealth. And Norway is only slightly ahead of the US. Considering the US’s far superior manufacturing capability, if Norway could go all electric, than the US certainly could have by now. Norway’s had to import almost all its electric cars; the US can make its own cars.
Why are you telling me about America?
Because the whole internet is America, at least that’s what Americans think.
I’m kidding, he/she/they probably wanted to provide an example of a country with a similar GDP that is in the exact opposite position.
You mean all that oil money that was spent on lying to the public and bribing politicians could have been spent on solving the problem this whole time?
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Care to point out what hate and misinformation is relevant to this? If other countries didn’t buy their oil, they could not have achieved this. Norway is a small petrostate with a side gig in poaching EU fish. No amount of Irish salmon would have covered the cost of this. If you don’t understand that a country smaller by population than the city of Barcelona exporting the fourth largest amount of natural gas in the world taints this achievement to some degree, you are entitled to your opinion, but it’s not misinformation.
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Absolutely it is better than not subsidising EV cars. No doubt. My issue is with the original comment painting this as something “barely any effort” implying that any country could do this. This was a unique situation and I’m glad that Norwegians chose to make themselves feel better about being an educated western petrostate bane on the planet by buying themselves EVs instead of feeding it to a king, ceo, sultan or emir.
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But I was told by Susan on Facebook that EVs can’t work in a cold place!
I think Susan meant in cold rural place where it’s hundreds of kilometers to a larger city and days trip to EV maintenance.
Local boy can dismantle and assemble her current Toyota Hilux if necessary.
From a mechanical standpoint, this is a silly argument. I’ve worked on cars for approx. 15 years as a hobby/side hustle, owned a mobile mechanic business for 2.5 years, and worked at a auto shop for a time as well. Trust me, EV’s are far more simple, hardware-wise. You could argue they’re not simple, software-wise, for the average consumer to work on themselves, but that would ignore the relative complexity of modern CANbus systems in new cars, with dozens of subsystems feeding multiple computers, all of which can malfunction and cause problems for the whole system. Such as when an led tail-light breaks and that bricks the whole car, leaving the owner potentially stranded.
ICE vehicles have to rely on and maintain multiple pressurized systems (with dozens of specialized seals), vacuum, dozens (sometimes hundreds) of sensors, relays, and valves, not to mention rapid heat differentials, all of the moving parts with bearings and added weights to counteract various forces…
I love the idea of only having to work on suspension/steering/brakes from time to time. Have a motor issue? Unplug it, undo a few bolts, and put a new one in over a single beer. Sounds awesome to me…
Thanks for writing this. I had zero idea what EVs mean for a mechanic.
I think you missed the point.
You could argue they’re not simple, software-wise, for the average consumer to work on themselves, but that would ignore the relative complexity of modern CANbus systems in new cars, with dozens of subsystems feeding multiple computers, all of which can malfunction and cause problems for the whole system. Such as when an led tail-light breaks and that bricks the whole car, leaving the owner potentially stranded.
You think people living in middle of nowhere wants a car like this, with nearest approved maintenance with all the correct databus plugins nowhere in sight.
Otherwise agreeing what you posted, and yes many new ICEs have equally complex software and databus systems to control the maintenance infrastructure and keep the money flowing to the manufacturer.
Yeah. It’s the range that’s killer. EVs can run in cold all day long. But running heavy duty heating to keep the cabin comfortable and the windows clear of ice, plus heating the battery pack to maintain performance, can cut the already overstated manufacturer range down by 30-40% or more. Which can bring a marginally OK travel range in a lot of areas down to “shit this isn’t enough”.
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Who can’t charge at home? Who is getting an EV before electricity in their house?
Apartments are seriously lagging on getting EV stations installed. Then there’s the issue of running power from the tenants meter to a dedicated parking spot (which would require cutting up sidewalks and the like). Even on a condo it can be a mess with the HOA.
There are plenty of landlords that won’t allow a tenant to install an EV outlet even on a SFU.
Let’s rethink this. The owners could have a dedicated electric line for charging. Then have power stations along the parking spots. People would then use their credit/debit cards to pay for the electricity just like we do at gas pumps.
And then you get landlords/complex owners gouging to charge your car.
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You wouldn’t blame a lack of convenient gas stations nearby as an issue with an ICE car, would you?
We do it with hydrogen cars… I don’t see the difference here.
The difference is that ICE cars are the gold(bronze? It’s not a high bar… just the one we’re used to) standard to currently beat. When Electric is just as convenient or better than ICE, I’m willing to bet that people will start to argue the other way. We already see it with people who can get away with Electric at home. It’s all they can go on about with how convenient that is… So much so that they seem to forget that it’s only convenient for them because they’re lucky enough to meet the requirements to make it convenient.
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The point is exactly that… “this is the world we live in”… And as that world evolves, or as technologies and consumer desires changes, what people will complain about will change as well.
If there were no gas stations around… I would blame ICE cars for needing gas and thus would choose something else that fits my needs better. The point is that infrastructure exists and is part of the package of buying the vehicle. It’s fair game for discussion, and thus blame.
