The future is electric! The EV revolution in Norway — Explanations and lessons learned

The paper presents an analysis of the ongoing battery electric vehicles (BEV) revolution in Norway focusing on the measures that have been introduced to support a modal shift away from the classical motor car. Different policy measures, BEV infrastructure and EV technology developments and their coherence are examined. The paper also looks into the situation for BEV in some other European countries before lessons learned are drawn. A list of policies that needs to be in place before one could expect a BEV takeoff in a given country is also presented. In total there were more than 9,500 BEVs and 330 Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles (PHEV) driving on Norwegian roads by the end of 2012-an increase of 4.679 in 2012 alone. BEVs and PHEVs amounted to about 3.1 percent of sales of new passenger cars. The corresponding figure for 2011 was 1.6 percent. In August 2013, BEVs alone accounted for over 6% of new car sales. If this trend continues, there could be more than 50.000 electric cars in Norway by the end of 2016. So how did this EV-revolution in Norway come about? The paper looks at policy measure, infrastructure developments and technology drivers which can help explain the rapid development seen in the Norwegian marketplace. This paper also examines the market penetration and the main differences in BEV policies in Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Portugal and Ireland. In the end a 3-step lesson to be learned for other countries are presented - with the Norwegian example as the starting point.