Why Norway is full of Teslas

If only our government wasn't bought out by dat Muslim oil :(

If I'm not mistaken, titles like that are against CoC.

Norway is one of the biggest petroleum exporters in the world. That's one of the reasons they're so much wealthier than Americans, Swedes, etc. Also the cobalt that these rich fucks' electric batteries use has a good chance of being mined by children in Africa.

So yeah.

Well when you can avoid to pay a tax through a minor change then most are going to take it.

If I had an electric car, I wouldn't get to the nearest airport without stopping to recharge for an hour and I was almost run over by an electric car, as I couldn't hear it coming around a bend. (and this was when electric cars were rare!)

Also I live in one of the greenest countries in the world (and have planted many trees) so all my emissions will be slurped up. Therefore I will continue to drive powerful, loud purring, far reaching, efficient petrol engines, and you will have to pluck the keys from my cold dead hands. Thank you.

Pretty much. Probably why I see about five Teslas a day living in the SF Bay Area as well...because A.) it's expensive here, and B.) proximity to Silicon Valley, and C.) eco-conscious hippie-spawn yuppies that have lots of money but don't want to be crunchy granola like their parents used to be :P

All joking aside, this video does present a lot of awesome stuff about a country who's population is just over 5 million people. That put's it somewhere between Alabama and Colorado as far as size, and yet it enjoys a per-capita GDP that is the second-highest in all of Europe! Which probably put's it in the top 20 in the world, I'd wager.

Which is why threads like this are so idiotic, because you're comparing apples to oranges to...golden eggs? A tiny country with like 0.00005% of the population of the world but probably 5% of it's wealth and we are supposed to be impressed they have their shit together?

*sigh*

Boy, I need my coffee. It's early and I am being cynical.

@lifelessablaze: I was going to lock this but there's some discussion here so I've edited your thread title to be a little bit less combative. No need to make it a "my country is better than yours" argument.

-Byshop

In the US they've actually changed the law. By 2019, all EVs will be required to make some sort of noise when travelling at under 18MPH.

About half of Tesla's sales in the US are in Cali. I think it's also where they have the highest number of their Supercharger stations, which are free to use (for life) for current owners. I was in Houston a few weeks ago and I remember seeing a bunch of them out there. That surprised me for a couple reasons. As a company they are fighting with nearly every state and car dealerships because of their direct sales model and Texas is a state where they cannot (yet) legally sell their cars. It also surprised me because Texas is all about 'dat oil and I didn't figure there'd be a ton of tree hugging hippies with more money than sense out there. :)

-Byshop

@Byshop: yeah that too (charging stations, free to use). My work put in a new parking lot, and installed like 10 charging stations. I think we got a fairly large tax credit for doing so.

It's an awesome system, and a great idea. Though what's this about Tesla charging people after five years or something? Like free charging but then then after X amount of years they're going to charge you, and it will be equivalent to gasoline prices? Think I read that somewhere.

Too bad Tesla hasn't made any money. And is dependent on government subsidies to stay afloat.

Hmm lets see. It is the only thing possible to buy in Norway without paying any taxes. Electricity is cheap, they pass toll roads free. Oh and less service on them. First owners of Teslas have saved maybe 100K $ or more.

Great, hopefully they do the same here soon. No more near-misses for me.

It's interesting that it's 18 Mph. This must be the speed that tyres make sufficient noise for people to hear. I would have thought it would be quicker.

Same law will come here in Norway. I sincerely hope it is only temporarily. Although I do see it last 10 years or more here.

There are a lot of sites with bad info out there, some of which are deliberately spreading falsehoods about the company (there's a lot of hate from oil companies). Unlimited Supercharging is lifetime for the life of the vehicle. Originally they were going to stop offering on vehicles delivered after Jan 2017, but they extended it, then they extended it again so anyone with a referral code can still get it on a new car even today. It will likely go away by the time the new, cheaper Model 3 gets into full swing but if you buy a Tesla today you can still get it. Hell, I have a code you can use. :)

As for the cost, it's based on local electricity prices and it's always much cheaper than gas. Here in Colorado, we pay about 11 cents per KW hour, and the cars typically go about 3.5 miles per KWH of charge. So a 75D will cost about $8.25 USD to recharge fully and go about 260 miles on that charge. Depending on what gas prices are at any given point, that's the price of anywhere between 2 to 4 gallons of gas. "Fuel" consumption on a Tesla is noticeably cheaper than even the most efficient gasoline cars, and you don't have to sacrifice performance or practicality in exchange for that efficiency. Hell, the P100D is actually the fastest mass produced car in the world with a 0-60 time of 2.3 seconds and quarter mile times in the mid 10s.

Also, bear in mind that Tesla owners are not reliant on Superchargers to recharge their cars. The network is intended for cross country driving. Normally you charge you car at home on a custom high-amp circuit you have installed, like a 50 amp circuit on a Nema 14-50 socket or a custom Tesla wall connector.

The biggest problem with them is the initial price tag, which (right now) puts them out of reach for the average commuter. However, the Model 3 is releasing this year which starts in the 35k range.

Actually the company turned its first profit 3rd quarter 2016.

http://money.cnn.com/2016/10/26/technology/tesla-earnings/index.html

The stock price just hit its all time high Thursday last week at more than $370 a share. They also just this last week passed BMW to become the 4th largest automaker of the year. The company is doing very well.

And as far as subsidies, that's a bit more complicated. Yes, Tesla has received government subsidies but the amount are only a fraction of what pretty much every other American auto maker has gotten. 2.4 billion in total, but 1 billion of that is for the construction of their Gigafactory in Nevada in the form of tax breaks for bringing that much work to the state, and they have to spend tens of billions of dollars in the state over a 20 year period to even realize all those breaks. Another half billion of that was a loan from the federal government that Tesla paid back early and with interest.

https://electrek.co/2016/11/25/tesla-subsidies-big-three-oil-industry/

That, plus I think it's based on speeds at which you're likely to be in the same place as pedestrians (like parking lots). Still, 18MPH is an oddly specific number. Not sure how they arrived at that.

-Byshop

Where I live, there's also a lot of Teslas. I live in San Jose, CA. Lots of exotic cars, too.

I wouldn't presume to tell you what to do with your past, sir. Just know that there are those of us who care about what you do with your future.

Well this is neat:

https://electrek.co/2017/06/10/tesla-autopilot-update-smooth-autopark/

The idea of a car that gets better with free software updates is kind of cool.

-Byshop

They have a good salaries due their oil supplies and they appreciate their nature as is common also in the other Scandinavian countries.

Just to share: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-06-02/denmark-is-killing-tesla-and-other-electric-cars

The tax incentives for EV purchases in the US are... weird and complicated but there are incentives to get US drivers to buy EVs. At the federal level, you get a refundable $7,500 tax credit on a new EV purchase from a dealer/manufacturer. It only counts for the vehicle once when it's first put into service. Also, only the first 200,000 EV sold by that manufacturer get that credit, after which they start to phase it out. Most of the auto makers hit that mark a long time ago but Teslas are so expensive that they have yet to hit that number in the US yet, although once their cheaper Model 3 hits the street that'll change pretty quickly.

As for the states, each state is different and they change from year to year in some cases. In Colorado, I got another 6k off my EV purchase last year, but this year it's 5k (although now it's not a refund but a 5k drop on the price at time of purchase). So between state and federal, I got 13.5k in refundable tax credit. I bought two EVs last year, so that would have meant a 27k return just from that (not counting my normal return) had I not sold a rental property last year and eaten some capital gains tax.

-Byshop

Cos Norway is very environmentally friendly and has a lot of wealthy people? Don't they all get like free oil money?

Wealthy in this case do not mean what you think it means. Yeah each and one of us has some over 100K $ "on book" because of oil. That money is meant to help with future investments and the fund is meant to be managed in such a way that it will never run empty. With todays spending, it will run out when I hit retirement.

Do you ever get to access it?

-Byshop

@horgen:

Right, but it's also one of the highest countries in terms of GDP per capita too. I assume that part doesn't include the oil fund?

@Byshop: not in a traditional sense, no. It's for future expenses and investments.

I don't know actually.

I'm confused by this answer. Does that mean it's like a trust fund that your mom sets up for you but that your drunken step-dad will blow on a 12 month drinking and gambling bender before you're old enough to claim it?

-Byshop

Change parents with politicians and you are sorta there. To make it clear: No one can single handed withdraw money from it. We do say that each one of us has X amount of money there, but that is because we say that what the state own, is actually owned by the people. The idea for what it should be used for and what it is actually used for is two different things. To begin with the idea was (I believe) to make sure the state had money for retirement when people are to old to work.

The politicians decides what the money will be used for it. 4% (now 3%) of the funds money can be used in the yearly budget the government proposes. It evens out financial "waves". If there is a sudden increase or decrease in money taken in through taxes, the amount withdrawn from the fund should go in the opposite direction.

Back to your analogy. At least when the limit for how much of the fund they could spend in a year was 4% (they can spend more if there is serious need for it, but that is years ago since it happened last) it was projected that by 2050 or 2060 the fund would actually be empty or close to it. (basically the effect of having it would translate to about 0 if there is only a few billions left in it and the government budget is >1000 billions). The expenses the government has have increased a lot the last 10 years. However a high oil price meant loads of money through taxes from the oil industry and the oil fund. The government didn't bother with being more effective. It had enough money to be ineffective. So our wise mommy was the politicians in the mid 90's. Drunken step-dad were the government from 2007 (or so) til present day.

It's difficult to explain when the reason behind the oilfund changes now and then.