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Norway is wealthy thanks to selling fossil fuels. Norwegians feel guilty about that, but not guilty enough to stop selling them. This is essentially performati

Norway is wealthy thanks to selling fossil fuels. Norwegians feel guilty about that, but not guilty enough to stop selling them. This is essentially performative environmentalism from them. Still, it will help other countries by throwing up unforeseen problems in all-electric ground transportation, and some solutions.

bellyfullofbac 5y ago
I don't think it's a country of virtue signallers as you think, just people who like to get the best bang for their buck. And gas cars as well as fuel get taxed so much, that buying electric makes sense for them. Who would've thunk, economic incentives help!? Sadly in many other places the deciding economic incentives are the ones the politicians get from the oil and ICE car industry.
- bagacrap 5y ago
  arguably, taxes are the government's way of making the decision for the people, so if by "Norway" gp more accurately meant "the government of Norway", you haven't refuted their claims
  - matsemann 5y ago
    We (as in the Norwegian population) have voted for politicians supporting this, though. At the election a month ago, it was just a thousand or so votes from being an incredible amount of green representatives.
- bpodgursky 5y ago
  The claim is not that the individuals buying cars are signalling, it is the public policy (incentivizing individual EV ownership while exporting carbon emissions) which is hypocritical.
  - opinion-is-bad 5y ago
    Norway also spends a lot of energy criticizing foreign regimes for attempting to follow the same path as Norway; prosperity through natural resource extraction. It’s great that Norway has gotten rich enough to turn the corner, but not every country is so fortunate.
- tokamak-teapot 5y ago
  You seem to be disregarding the possibility that Norwegians care about the environmental impact of fossil fuels. Do you not consider this likely?
shkkmo 5y ago
Norway has been doing a relatively good job of investing their oil revenue into technologies and infrastructure that will carry their economy through the end of oil and hopefully help reduce global warming. Given their relatively contribution to the total global production and OPEC's supply management to control prices, it is unclear if a halt in Norwegian oil sales would raise prices significantly enough to matter. There is an argument to be made that is is better for Norway to capture those profit and invest them into the research we need to reduce oil dependence and sequester CO2. I don't think that the electric car adoption is purely driven by environmentalism. Norway has extremely cheap energy that makes electric cars much more economically attractive.
- dagw 5y ago
  I don't think that the electric car adoption is purely driven by environmentalism. On an individual level basically no one in Norway buys an electric car due to environmentalism. It's 100% an economic decision. Buying a new gasoline powered car today in Norway simply doesn't make financial sense no matter how you look at it.
- tuatoru 5y ago
  s/oil/heroin/g
outside1234 5y ago
They also get the shit taxed out of them for buying a IC car, so electric cars are actually cheaper.
- robotresearcher 5y ago
  Which is a political decision made in a democracy, not a law of physics. Norwegians chose to do this. (Yes, a relatively small subset of people are actually empowered in a democracy, but it's the least-bad system known, etc etc).
  - richlandlord 5y ago
    Not only there was no referendum that allowed Norwegians to decide if this was their political volition, but political volition alone is not enough to tax something. If it were, everything would be taxed, because you can construct any 51% against any 49% on any topic and add a tax. If you want to know what Norwegians really think about the tax, make it optional and see how many people pay for it.
    - vkou 5y ago
      > If you want to know what Norwegians really think about the tax, make it optional and see how many people pay for it. If you want to see what Norwegians really think about paying for things in stores, make shoplifting laws completely optional, and replace cash registers with tip jars, and see how that works out.
      - richlandlord 5y ago
        I think if you did that people would pay or face the wrath of the seller. I dont think this makes the point you think it does.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
nso 5y ago
Norway has been relatively wealthy for quite some time. Before oil it was from fishing and shipping, amongst others.
digikata 5y ago
It’s a matter of some pragmatism. At least their sovereign wealth fund is trying. As much as I wish all nations would take more serious action on the issue, it would seem self defeating for a small nation to step out too early ahead of larger nations in cutting off a major source of revenue. Meanwhile, maybe they’re doing better with the profits for themselves and the world by directing their wealth fund as they are. https://www.wsj.com/articles/norways-sovereign-wealth-fund-boosts-renewable-energy-divests-fossil-fuels-11560357485 https://www.wsj.com/articles/norways-sovereign-wealth-fund-b...

bellyfullofbac 5y ago

I don't think it's a country of virtue signallers as you think, just people who like to get the best bang for their buck. And gas cars as well as fuel get taxed so much, that buying electric makes sense for them. Who would've thunk, economic incentives help!? Sadly in many other places the deciding economic incentives are the ones the politicians get from the oil and ICE car industry.

bagacrap 5y ago
arguably, taxes are the government's way of making the decision for the people, so if by "Norway" gp more accurately meant "the government of Norway", you haven't refuted their claims
- matsemann 5y ago
  We (as in the Norwegian population) have voted for politicians supporting this, though. At the election a month ago, it was just a thousand or so votes from being an incredible amount of green representatives.
bpodgursky 5y ago
The claim is not that the individuals buying cars are signalling, it is the public policy (incentivizing individual EV ownership while exporting carbon emissions) which is hypocritical.
- opinion-is-bad 5y ago
  Norway also spends a lot of energy criticizing foreign regimes for attempting to follow the same path as Norway; prosperity through natural resource extraction. It’s great that Norway has gotten rich enough to turn the corner, but not every country is so fortunate.
tokamak-teapot 5y ago
You seem to be disregarding the possibility that Norwegians care about the environmental impact of fossil fuels. Do you not consider this likely?

shkkmo 5y ago

Norway has been doing a relatively good job of investing their oil revenue into technologies and infrastructure that will carry their economy through the end of oil and hopefully help reduce global warming. Given their relatively contribution to the total global production and OPEC's supply management to control prices, it is unclear if a halt in Norwegian oil sales would raise prices significantly enough to matter. There is an argument to be made that is is better for Norway to capture those profit and invest them into the research we need to reduce oil dependence and sequester CO2. I don't think that the electric car adoption is purely driven by environmentalism. Norway has extremely cheap energy that makes electric cars much more economically attractive.

dagw 5y ago
I don't think that the electric car adoption is purely driven by environmentalism. On an individual level basically no one in Norway buys an electric car due to environmentalism. It's 100% an economic decision. Buying a new gasoline powered car today in Norway simply doesn't make financial sense no matter how you look at it.
tuatoru 5y ago
s/oil/heroin/g

outside1234 5y ago

They also get the shit taxed out of them for buying a IC car, so electric cars are actually cheaper.

robotresearcher 5y ago
Which is a political decision made in a democracy, not a law of physics. Norwegians chose to do this. (Yes, a relatively small subset of people are actually empowered in a democracy, but it's the least-bad system known, etc etc).
- richlandlord 5y ago
  Not only there was no referendum that allowed Norwegians to decide if this was their political volition, but political volition alone is not enough to tax something. If it were, everything would be taxed, because you can construct any 51% against any 49% on any topic and add a tax. If you want to know what Norwegians really think about the tax, make it optional and see how many people pay for it.
  - vkou 5y ago
    > If you want to know what Norwegians really think about the tax, make it optional and see how many people pay for it. If you want to see what Norwegians really think about paying for things in stores, make shoplifting laws completely optional, and replace cash registers with tip jars, and see how that works out.
    - richlandlord 5y ago
      I think if you did that people would pay or face the wrath of the seller. I dont think this makes the point you think it does.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

nso 5y ago

Norway has been relatively wealthy for quite some time. Before oil it was from fishing and shipping, amongst others.

digikata 5y ago

It’s a matter of some pragmatism. At least their sovereign wealth fund is trying. As much as I wish all nations would take more serious action on the issue, it would seem self defeating for a small nation to step out too early ahead of larger nations in cutting off a major source of revenue. Meanwhile, maybe they’re doing better with the profits for themselves and the world by directing their wealth fund as they are. https://www.wsj.com/articles/norways-sovereign-wealth-fund-boosts-renewable-energy-divests-fossil-fuels-11560357485 https://www.wsj.com/articles/norways-sovereign-wealth-fund-b...