Norway Updates: Subaru, Mazda, & Ford Sales Plummet, Hydrogen Car Sales Frozen, Tesla Sales Jump
Norwegian Twitter user Tesla Driver tweeted an article from the daily Norwegian business paper Finansavisen (behind a paywall) that highlighted more bad news for car companies slow to electrify in Norway. His translation of the article shows that the cost is high for companies not having EVs in a market that has transitioned to electric vehicles so dramatically.
Subaru sales are down 66% in 2019, Mazda sales are down 45% in the last 3 years, and Ford sales are down 50% in the last 10 years. In case you missed it, last month we reported on layoffs at a leading Mercedes dealer due to its lack of competitive products. Automakers and dealers slow to electrify are suffering.
That foreshadows the upheaval that could come to larger auto markets if manufactures don’t take the disruption from EVs too seriously.
Hydrogen Fueling Station Explosion
In other news from Norway, Hegnar.no reports that Toyota and Hyundai have stopped selling hydrogen cars in Norway. The manufactures were forced to get loaner cars to the few people who had purchased hydrogen cars, since all the hydrogen fuel stations are closed while the government investigates an explosion at a hydrogen fueling station.
This article (in Norwegian) states that the explosion was caused by a leak in a high-pressure hydrogen tank, but they have not yet found what ignited the hydrogen. This article reports that even after fires and horrible sales, as well as extreme incentives in both California and Norway, the International Energy Agency released a report (surely written before the fires) saying the fuel is an important part of a low carbon future. I wonder what it will take for people to give up on this fuel that seems to have no advantages left now that EV charging has improved so dramatically.
End-Of-Quarter Push
Those watching Norwegian car registrations in realtime on the teslastats.no site noticed today was the first 200 Tesla delivery day of the second quarter. I missed capturing a picture before it rolled over to the next day, but Morten Grove documented it on Twitter, as you can see above. It is likely that we will see a lot more in the next 13 days. According to my friend Lasse Edvardsen, his friend has gotten a confirmed June delivery of a Standard Range Plus in Norway! Once those start arriving, I expect sales to expand even more.
Use my Tesla referral link to get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging on a Tesla Model S, Model X, or Model 3, here’s the link: https://ts.la/paul92237 (but if someone else helped you more, please use their link instead of mine).
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