Sunday, November 21, 2021
EVs in Norway are CHEAPER than regular cars
Money talks: EVs have gone from making up less than 2 per cent of new car sales to more than three quarters
In the early 1990s, Norway began introducing the policies that would later drive an EV transition, including abolishing or waiving various taxes to reduce the up-front and lifetime cost of EVs.
Strangely enough, one catalyst for this was the Norwegian '80s synth-pop band A-ha, otherwise best known for the song Take On Me.
In 1989, two members of the trio bought a converted EV (range: 45km) and drove it around Norway, stubbornly refusing to pay road tolls or registration, to protest the disincentives to owning an electric car.
The government caved and waived the tolls and fees for EVs, which cost little because there were so few EVs at the time.
Unintentionally, however, it had introduced the first EV purchase incentives and laid the groundwork for the coming boom in EV sales.
In 2001, the most important of these incentives was introduced when EVs were made exempt from the hefty 25 per cent GST.
All up, EVs in Norway are cheaper to buy than regular cars.
The tax breaks, combined with lower ongoing fuel and maintenance costs and reduced fees for toll roads and parking, makes a persuasive economic argument, says Snorre Sletvold, business developer for the Norwegian EV Association. "I think you need purchase incentives," he said.
"Maybe not zero per cent sales tax like we have in Norway, but some subsidies to kick off the markets."
Once enough people start buying EVs, others follow, he says. Sales snowball through personal recommendations, or what he calls "neighbourhood effect".
"We have the people talking to each other in the neighbourhood, they say, 'You're using an EV, don't you run out of energy on your battery?' "They say, 'No, not at all, it works pretty well.'"
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Prince Charles's dirty secret: Diesel generators power winter lights display at Sandringham
At the Cop26 summit this month he made an impassioned plea to stop climate change and warned we were in the ‘last chance saloon’. But Prince Charles’s green credentials were called into question yesterday as it emerged a winter lights display at Sandringham is running on diesel generators.
The Luminate attraction at the Queen’s Norfolk estate is powered by the generators, along with a funfair and car park floodlights erected for the five-week event.
Visitors saw six machines around the estate, which is now largely run by Charles in an effort to shoulder some of the Queen’s day-to-day tasks.
At the summit in Glasgow, Charles warned that ‘the future of humanity and nature herself are at stake’.
Despite his powerful speech, the Luminate show uses some 60,000 bulbs. Visitors pay up to £18.50 to follow the mile-long trail, which features 13 installations. The night-time light displays operate for at least four hours a day.
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Climate campaigners take South Africa to court over coal policy
South Africa’s plan to build new coal-fired power stations during the climate crisis is being challenged in court for breaching the rights of current and future generations.
Three civil society organisations have launched a constitutional lawsuit in the North Gauteng high court against the South African government, arguing that its energy policy is incompatible with the national constitution.
Coal makes up about 80% of South Africa’s energy mix, and the government intends to add 1,500MW more over the next six years as part of its 2019 integrated resource plan.
Earlier this year, the International Energy Agency said no new coal-fired power stations could be built if the world is to stay within safe limits of global heating.
Although South Africa has not explicitly agreed to phase out the fossil fuel, it was one of 197 countries to commit to “phasing down” coal at the Cop26 global climate summit in Glasgow last week.
Cyril Ramaphosa, the South African president, admits the climate crisis is “the most pressing issue of our time” and that developing economies are particularly vulnerable. As well as the direct dangers of rising temperatures, the climate emergency poses a particular threat to South Africa because of its existing water and food insecurity.
But, despite being given about $8.5bn (£6.3bn)_from European countries and the US to help it move away from coal, Gwede Mantashe, the energy minister, said it would continue to play a significant role in the nation’s electricity generation.
Campaigners say the problem is not being taken seriously enough, pointing to research by the University of Cape Town and the Climate Equity Reference Project that shows the coal plans are not compatible with South Africa meeting its climate commitments.
The youth-led African Climate Alliance, the Vukani Environmental Justice Movement in Action and Groundwork argue that continuing coal development breaches constitutional rights to life, dignity and equality, the right to a healthy environment and children’s rights.
The campaigners say there is no justifiable basis for limiting their constitutional rights because renewable energy is a feasible alternative and is cleaner and cheaper than new coal power.
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Australia: Greenies don't like hydrogen either
Owners of Fortescue Metals Group Limited (ASX:FMG) shares may want to know about a threat to Fortescue Future Industries’ (FFI) hydrogen plans.
Fortescue Future Industries says it’s taking a global leadership position in the renewable energy and green products industry and has a vision to make green hydrogen the most globally traded seaborne commodity in the world.
But not everyone likes the plans that Fortescue Future Industries is doing.
According to reporting by the Australian Financial Review, the former leader of the Greens, Bob Brown, has said that green hydrogen must not be “based on mega dam projects, bird-killing wind farms or without a “social licence” that returns foreign earnings to communities.”
Energy Minister Angus Taylor reportedly released modelling that showed green hydrogen could replace LNG as the top energy export, with $50 billion of revenue by 2050.
The AFR speculated that the Greens could use any balance of political power to block hydrogen projects that sustain fossil-fuel industries, like ‘blue hydrogen’.
The Bob Brown Foundation took out a full-page advert in the AFR this week to challenge some of Dr Forrest’s claims and Fortescue Future Industries’ potential projects including hydroelectric dams in countries like the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Papua New Guinea.
What’s the problem?
Why doesn’t Dr Brown like these projects? The Bob Brown Foundation said the aim is to foster debate about the environmental and social impacts of Fortescue Future Industries’ global hydrogen production. Bob Brown said:
He is promoting huge hydro-electric schemes on some of the world’s last remaining great rivers and there would be massive social and environmental consequences. As reported in the AFR, he has contracted with the president of the DRC for a scheme on the Congo River twice the size of China’s Twin Gorges Dam. It is reported to threaten the displacement of 25,000 people, involves massive transmission lines, and has been dropped by previous interested parties including the World Bank.
In Papua New Guinea, Forrest’s hydrogen vision brings dams on a number of major rivers into focus. There can have been no time to consult the local populations nor to assess the impact on some of the most spectacular tropical gorges on Earth. His global vision deserves global scrutiny. We want him to get social licences. That is what we seek.
We support a hydrogen economy based on renewable energy where the production of that energy does not contribute to climate change, damage the environment or cause social dislocation. That is going to take a lot more considered judgement than is evident in Dr Forrest’s global mission.
Time will tell what impact, if any, this has on Fortescue Future Industries, the Fortescue share price and FFI’s green hydrogen plans.
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My other blogs. Main ones below
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM )
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)
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Jim Hansen and his twin
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