Norway is leading the world's electric vehicle market, having registered its 50,000th electric car in April of this year. In the first quarter of 2015, 8,112 plug-in electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles were sold in Norway, accounting for a third of the country's total vehicle registrations, according to IHS Automotive.
Compared to other countries, that is quite an achievement. The Netherlands sold 5,760 electric vehicles in Q1, and these accounted for a 5.7 percent share of all registrations, some distance behind Norway's 33.1 percent. In the United States and France, electric cars had a 0.8 percent share of registrations.
For Norway, the positive sales are actually turning out to be a little bit too positive. The government has offered a number of tax cuts and benefits as an incentive, including exemptions from tolls and parking fees in some cases. However, the subsidy-driven sales boom has actually created a tax shortfall of 2 billion crowns ($267.79 million), according to Reuters.
Norway is now reviewing its policy of tax breaks for electric car buyers amid the shortfall in state revenue, though the government has stressed that benefits will remain in place to ensure the success continues. Even though electric vehicles enjoyed that 33 percent sales share in Q1, they account for a mere 2 percent of all cars on Norway's roads. Still, in most other countries, they only account for a fraction of a percent.
*Click below to enlarge (charted by Statista)
