Almost half of new cars sold in Norway in the first six months of 2019 were powered by fully electric engines, up from just over a quarter in the same period last year, ensuring the Nordic nation retains its top global ranking in electric vehicle sales.
Tesla's Model 3 was Norway's top-selling vehicle, the Norwegian Road Federation (NRF) said when announcing the latest sales data on Monday.
In total, 48.4% of all new cars sold from January to June were electric, surpassing the 31.2% seen for the full year 2018, and making oil-producing Norway the global leader in per-capita electric car sales by a wide margin.
Seeking to end the sale of diesel and petrol engines by the middle of the next decade, Norway exempts battery-driven cars from the heavy taxes imposed on vehicles powered by fossil fuel. It also offers benefits such as discounts on road tolls.
The policy has boosted brands such as Tesla, Nissan, Hyundai and BMW, which all offer fully electric vehicles, rather than hybrids that use electric motors to drive the car but also have a combustion engine.
Brands without fully electric offerings, such as Ford and Daimler's Mercedes-Benz, have seen sales drop, although Ford and Mercedes are among several auto makers that have promised to offer electric cars in Norway from 2020.
California-based Tesla sold 3,760 vehicles in Norway in June, for a 24.5% share of all cars during the month, and was also the top-selling brand for the first six months.
Most of its sales were of the mid-sized Model 3, while the bigger Model S and Model X have seen lower year-on-year volumes.
The International Energy Agency (IEA), which includes the more widely-sold plug-in hybrids when counting electric cars, measured Norway's share at 39% of sales in 2017, far ahead of second-placed Iceland on 12% and Sweden on 6%.
MrRGG on July 7th, 2019 at 21:15 UTC »
Gas is Norway is $7.30/gal ($1.95/liter) so it's not surprising at all that electric is a big winner with average consumers. Plus the tax rate on gas cars can be 100%, while it's 0% on electric.
nessager on July 7th, 2019 at 19:27 UTC »
I'm in the UK, I would love an electric car but our incentives and electric car costs are a joke. They keep putting taxes on everything to try and get us to go green, but don't offer us anything to help us get over the initial outlay.
ac13332 on July 7th, 2019 at 16:34 UTC »
They subsidise electric vehicles through the profits they make from selling fossil fuels to other countries.
Norway can produce >100% of its power through renewables but also has large fossil fuel reserves. It uses renewables for itself and exports the rest to others.