Norway Agrees On Banning New Sales Of Gas-Powered Cars By 2025: Report (electrek.co)

If you live in Norway, an all-electric future is likely closer than you think. The country's four leading political parties have agreed to a plan to stop selling gas-powered cars by 2025, according to a report. Electrek reports: The four main political parties, both from the right and the left, have agreed on a new energy policy that will include a ban on new gasoline-powered car sales as soon as 2025 -- making it one of the most aggressive timeline of its kind for such a policy. What's probably most remarkable here is that Norway is currently one of the world's largest Oil exporters.Tesla CEO Elon Musk was rather pleased with the announcement. He said, "Just heard that Norway will ban new sales of fuel cars in 2025. What an amazingly awesome country. You guys rock!!"

Comments

Winter?

[Anonymous Coward]

How are they going to travel in very cold days?

Re:Winter?

[fluffernutter]

Where I am it goes down to -35C.

I am told that EVs handle this temperature just fine, because they use EVs in Norway.

Re:Winter?

[St.Creed]

In Norway, 400 kilometers is "all day driving". Literally - it came as something of a surprise after arriving there and having to drive from Oslo to Bergen. Took 8 hours and we drove "highway" (lol) all the way. A highway in Norway is something where you move from curve to curve, and you actually have two whole lanes so you don't need to wait until the opposing cars are gone before you can use the road. At least, not all the time.

I think a Tesla is uniquely suited to Norway: lots of very cheap hydro-electric power, which they sell but could also use themselves. Lots of money to subsidize the transition. Lots of money for building new infrastructure. I'm quite jealous :)

Cuban Norway . . .

[PolygamousRanchKid]

So there will be a ban on "new" gas powered cars. But what about older, used cars? I'm thinking the Norwegians will go the way of the Cubans, and develop ways to keep the older cars running as long as possible. In Havana, you can see running examples of the best that Detroit produced in the 50's. Ingenuity, duck tape, chewing gum and chicken wire keep them running. I'm guessing that the Norwegians can pull off that feat, as well.

Plus, the Norwegians are super cool, brave, daring and unafraid. What do you cook for Christmas dinner? Toss a frozen Butterball in the oven? Norwegians skewer a sheep's head on a pike in their backyards, and cook it with a flame thrower. Supposedly, the eyes of the critter taste the best.

I would not mess with those folks. In other news, the Norwegians have wisely invested their oil fortunes for future generations. Unlike some Gulf states, who build fancy hotel palaces.

Re:Cuban Norway . . .

[Ramze]

My bet is that since Norway already has the highest per capita usage of electric cars, the gasoline ones will simply slowly go extinct after the legislation. Gas and diesel are generally more expensive in Europe than the USA to begin with, and people are welcoming the switch.

I imagine 10 or 20 years after the ban of new sales, gas stations might start to disappear first. Once the infrastructure for gasoline vehicles is gone, they'll start to die off even faster -- my bet is most will be sold to other countries. At least in Cuba, there are gas stations. No one is going to keep up an old clunker if they have to import and store the gasoline themselves.... and figure out where to gas up on long trips.

Hydropower

[TeknoHog]

What's probably most remarkable here is that Norway is currently one of the world's largest Oil exporters.

They also have plenty of hydroelectric power, so they can basically power themselves sustainably while selling all the oil. Talk about winning the geographic lottery.

Re:Elon Musk

[Ramze]

Business man who opened up all of his patents to his competitors and whose competitors are all currently engineering all-electric vehicles as well is happy because it's the right thing to do. If you think Telsa will be the only all-electric car company by then, you're misinformed.

All cars are going hybrid or electric-only soon -- though a few companies are still toying with hydrogen fuel cells. Those hydrogen powered vehicles are still on the drawing board as the only commercially successful ones were large passenger buses, and they're still not very well designed.

Re:WTF

[Kjella]

3. Not really socialists. Labour party (maybe more like democrats) were kicked out of power. Norway now has a conservative government. (maybe more between democrats and republicans)

No. Not even close. Even the right-most party of our coalition is definitively to the left of the democratic party, maybe if they elected Bernie Sanders and took a big step to the left they'd be getting close. The labour party and their coalition partners including the "socialist left" (SV) are so far off the charts I don't know how to describe it to an American. They're not totalitarian, but so egalitarian that... one of their youth politicians seriously wanted "equal pay for work". Not "equal pay for equal work", but what I just said. They want us out of NATO, if we just don't threaten anyone nobody will threaten us. That really worked out great for us during WWII, we totally didn't threaten Germany in any way and they totally didn't occupy us for five years. Sigh.

Maybe I'll try for a Star Trek analogy since this is /., in one of the TNG episodes Q was stripped of his power and chose the human race as his sanctuary when he had nothing. Well, if I was stripped of everything and had to pick a country on earth I'd pick Norway. Nowhere else are you treated with that much pity, this much aid, so few demands and so little resentment. Even when we had a mass murderer (Breivik) killing almost 70 of our teens and a dozen more in total the worst that happen was that one person threw a shoe - and he apoligized to the court. I've heard it said about Gandhi you'd hardly believe such a man could exist, well Norway is pretty much the same when it comes to nations. I'm amazed that our naivety has gotten us so far.

Re:WTF

[ultranova]

In the past 30 years it has grown from 10% of GDP to over 60%.

As it happens, the past 30 years have also seen a huge shift to the right. By contrast, Finland's socialist period saw the shift from an agrarian backwater to an industrial power.

Socialism always looks nice until you run our of other people's money (then it looks like Venezuela).

Socialism works as long as people in charge care more about building up the country more than filling their pockets or advancing their pet ideology (ironically enough, that includes socialism itself). Sadly, our current government is determined to not just loot the country for the benefit of the owning class but also destroying the very institutions that would allow it to be rebuilt, such as education, postal system, public roads, and government ownership of various industries.

In any case it doesn't matter. Capitalism nearly collapsed when Great Depression put people out of work, and thus made them unable to participate in the economy. This time the same is done by technological progress brought on by capitalism's own inexorable logic. The Age of Capital is ending, and the shadow of Soviet Union still weights down socialism as a viable alternative making peaceful transition difficult if not impossible, so I suppose we're heading for another age of turmoil and revolutions. The question is: what, if anything, will be left standing after Capitalism is done falling?