
Tesla Model 3 accounted for over 12% of Norwegian auto market in Jan-July - rawland
https://cleantechnica.com/2019/08/16/tesla-model-3-12-4-of-all-norwegian-vehicle-sales-january-july-2019/
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Traster
It's depressing looking at the other EVs on that list. Where's my electric BMW
3 series?

Over the last decade people have been quite rightly pointing out that Tesla
are in trouble because sticking some batteries and electric engines into a car
isn't actually crazy difficult and all Tesla's production problems will kill
it in competition with real car manufacturers. Yet somehow that just hasn't
happened at all. The people who talked about the inability of large incumbents
to react were dead right.

I'm still bearish on Tesla - I think they've pumped their share price with
false claims about self-driving, but they have really dominated electric
vehicles.

~~~
kilroy123
I was talking to a big wig at Ford the other day, without too much detail, he
works on their EV program. He admitted they are behind and Tesla is actually
way ahead of the competition in many areas.

It _is_ difficult to put a battery and electric engines in a car and they've
run into difficulties. Though it sounds like they're on their way to putting
out a decent EV, and he thinks they and others will eventually catch up.

He also thinks Telsa will ultimately be killed by Chinese battery
manufactures, which I thought was interesting.

~~~
jdhn
Did he say what areas Tesla was ahead in?

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marvin
For Norwegians currently looking for an electric car, it's a no-brainer. It's
slightly more expensive than the Nissan Leaf 2 that has similar range, but you
also get the option of a tow hitch, and the driving experience is in a
different league. Plus access to supercharger network that actually works and
doesn't require fifteen minutes of fiddling every time.

My parents just bought one in spite of having initially dismissed it as likely
too expensive. Turned out to be perfectly competitive with everything that's
comparable in range and features, and a much better user experience overall.
We'll see how the service and reliability turns out, that's the only wildcard
I can think of.

~~~
mikekchar
Can you expand on a few of your comments. I have an older Leaf in Japan and
I've never seen a Model 3 before, so I'm curious about the difference.

\- "the driving experience is in a different league". In what way? I was
surprised at how much I enjoy driving the leaf (except for very poor turning
radius, which I can't quite understand). What's better in the Model 3?

\- "doesn't require fifteen minutes of fiddling every time". What does that
mean? I don't have trouble charging my Leaf. Is that something specific about
the supercharger network (which isn't in Japan), or are you referring to
something else?

~~~
pi-rat
Not OP, but..

The superchargers just work. Arrive, plug in, it's charging.

Other fast chargers are often much more cumbersome, requiring you to
installing an app, registering an RFID tag, adding your credit card, etc. I've
6 different apps installed on my phone for different charging networks here in
Norway, and 2-3 RFID tags in my car.

Many of them are also unstable, or have terrible UX and weird quirks. If you
need to make a seven minute video[1] to explain how to use it, you're doing it
wrong..

It's getting better though, software is improving, growing pains handled. A
future CCS revision (the most used charge plug in Europe) will include
"plug&charge" with payment handled by the car - making it more super charger
like.

[1]:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLe5jvx0NkI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLe5jvx0NkI)

~~~
mikekchar
Really interesting. In Japan, the navigation unit on the Leaf has all of the
charging stations built in. Then you plug it in and put your charging card on
the proximity sensor (well, you have to push a button 3 times as well). But
that's it. I think that's probably the advantage of owning the charging
infrastructure. I'm very much wondering how the landscape will change once
Toyota enters the fray (which I think it later this year if I'm not mistaken).

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Pete-Codes
I was speaking to a Norwegian friend last night and she confirmed it. There
are so many incentives like paying less/no vehicle tax and yeah, they are 100%
hydroelectric so they are perfect place. Might have to move there!

~~~
burntoutfire
The Teslas are not more affordable there than in the US, they're just less of
a bad option - petrol cars are taxed so heavily in the Nordics that it makes
an electric a good value for money. You're still better off in the US though,
where electric costs the same, but you have an option of reasonably priced
petrol cars.

~~~
Synaesthesia
Well that’s good that they’re racing petrol cars and I applaud them for doing
it. They’re wealthy enough to be able to afford it. It’s what’s necessary to
move away from carbon.

~~~
close04
> It’s what’s necessary to move away from carbon.

You hear that a lot and yet the second someone poses the hypothetical question
of whether everything should be taxed according to its actual “carbon
lifecycle”# (and perhaps even beyond carbon) you usually get a “weelll...
buuuuttt...”.

#That [whatever] that came on the most polluting cargo ship humans could
build? Add $xxx to the price tag.

~~~
SECProto
I gather you are referring to the oft-quoted stat about the cargo ship being
"more polluting" than so many millions of cars? That is referring specifically
to SOx I believe. It definitely is not referring to carbon emissions.
Container ships have the lowest gCO2/(km*kg)

~~~
close04
It was more generic than that (see mention of beyond carbon). Otherwise we’d
still be heavily promoting diesel as the clean alternative to gasoline. The
cargo ship was just something to exemplify the point of taxing for destroying
the environment. You’re free to pick any example you feel suits better and the
principle will still apply.

~~~
SECProto
I'm all in favour of carbon tax to reduce emissions. They would result in
pressure for electric vehicles of all sorts, improve the economics for
renewable electricity, maybe increase funding availability for carbon capture
research. Cargo ships would likely stay the same for a long time in the future
(but might implement fuel reduction techniques that are at a lower TRL
(thinking specifically of a long lead parasail/kite that I read about a couple
years back)

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kmlx
1\. 100% taxes on petrol cars

2\. no VAT on electric cars

3\. average income of $3500 in Oslo, one of the highest in the EU

4\. total population of 5 million, less than Denmark, less than the city of
Hong Kong

considering these facts i would say it is a bit surprising they didn't sell
more than they did. but still great to see those number.

~~~
phaemon
On point 3: Norway isn't in the EU.

On point 4: what does the population have to do with it? If they had a
population of 50 million, would that negate points 1-3 in some way? Another
way of describing their population might be, "roughly the same size as the
average US state".

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JBiserkov
Some context: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plug-
in_electric_vehicles_in_N...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plug-
in_electric_vehicles_in_Norway#Government_goals_and_incentives)

------
Merrill
Looks like a quite different car market. The first 3-row SUV is the Mitsubishi
Outlander in 6th place. The market looks like mostly compact sedans and
compact/subcompact SUVs. There is a lack of pickups and mid/large SUVs.

From other sources, it appears that the VW Transporter/Caravelle and the VW
Caddy both sell in volumes that would put them in the middle of the list. So
there may be a difference in how light vehicles are classified between the US
and Norway. [https://www.statista.com/statistics/731767/number-of-sold-
va...](https://www.statista.com/statistics/731767/number-of-sold-vans-and-
trucks-in-norway-by-model/)

~~~
varjag
Different than North America maybe. Not different from most of Europe.

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obtino
With the price of fuel in Norway, it's not surprising to see people turning
towards EV.

~~~
markdown
Surprising. Most oil-producing countries have dirt-cheap domestic fuel prices.

~~~
FartyMcFarter
Norway is more forward thinking than most countries.

They know that oil is not going to make their country rich forever.

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segmondy
It's actually interesting that there's no major American car in that list. Not
even Bolt or Volt. :-/ Might not be much of a signal, but might be that the
big 3 have really missed the road on EV.

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bryanlarsen
A car sold today is more likely than not to still be on the road in 2030.
Meeting our 2030 goals would be a _lot_ easier if the majority of cars sold
this year were zero-emissions world-wide.

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lifeisstillgood
In the UK company car market, Tesla 3 seems be making a smash for similar
reasons - a friend currently pays almost 6k in tax on their car - but is
changing their fleet to Tesla's - and that 6k cost vanishes for same price to
the company - effectively a 6k salary hike.

That will make a huge difference if marketed right.

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new_realist
Tesla sales in Norway are down quarter over quarter. See [http://eu-
evs.com](http://eu-evs.com).

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botto
I do wonder how the electrical grid in Norway is going to hold up to the
massive increase in demand that EV charging will cause.

~~~
Traster
Norway is in a great position, they're world leaders in hydro and their
geography makes that a great source of energy. In 2015 Norway's Hydro-electric
generation accounted for 95.8% of it's electricity generation. Norway accounts
for _half_ of Europe's entire hydro reservoir capacity. Meanwhile if demand
rises they can also import electricity via the North Sea wind power hub, or
from Sweden.

That's one of the great things about electric cars in Norway - you're actually
going to get electricity from renewable sources.

~~~
arcticfox
What is the ecological impact of hydro there? In the US PNW we seem to be
taking _out_ hydro due to fish rather than putting in new dams, although I
haven't followed it closely

~~~
tyfon
Building damns have a huge impact and there have been many fights over them as
in Alta [1]. They also have a large CO2 cost [2] when being built as it
requires massive amounts of concrete.

However they are now built and there is still plenty of capacity so there have
been no new major ones built for a long time.

There are some smaller privately owned ones being built but not on a big
scale.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alta_Hydroelectric_Power_Stati...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alta_Hydroelectric_Power_Station)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_concre...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_concrete)

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thewhitetulip
I'm waiting for a reliable long range battery vehicle. Most vehicles in Indian
market have to replace batteries in 5yrs.

~~~
pi-rat
Didn’t the Hyundai Kona launch recently in India? I’m super happy with mine
here in Norway. Comes with a 8 year battery warranty here. Easily does over
500 km per charge on Norwegian roads.

~~~
thewhitetulip
It did. But the issue is the price. It costs equal to an entry level Mercedes
or Audi

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drmacak
I still feel that only EV is not the answer. You have also get the electricity
somewhere so some investment in modern nucler power plants and fusion would be
even better then just blindly pushing EVs.

~~~
thinkcontext
To get to zero carbon emissions we'll need both zero carbon transportation and
zero carbon electricity. $100B's are being invested in zero carbon
electricity, so your suggestion that EVs are taking away from that are
mistaken.

As for nuclear, the US and Europe have been unable to build plants that do not
go 3x+ over budget and time.

