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Many Norwegian fjords present similar difficulties to bridge builders, so instead the country's coastal population relies on ferries that link their often remote communities.
Each year, some 20 million cars, vans and trucks cross the country's many fjords on roughly 130 ferry routes.
Most of Norway's ferries run on diesel, spewing out noxious fumes and CO2.
But this is about to change.
Following two years of trials of the world's first electric car ferry, named Ampere, ferry operators are busy making the transition from diesel to comply with new government requirements for all new ferry licensees to deliver zero- or low-emission alternatives.
"We continue the work with low-emission ferries because we believe it will benefit the climate, Norwegian industry and Norwegian jobs," Prime Minister Erna Solberg said in a speech in April 2016, in which she vowed to help fund required quayside infrastructure.
Ferry company Fjord1, which operates the MF Norangsfjord, has ordered three fully electric ferries that are scheduled to enter active service on some of its routes in January 2018.
Norway has also been a strong adopter of electric cars.
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Wednesday April 05 2017, @01:57PM (3 children)
According to a 2005 article: especially in tropical countries, hydroelectric schemes can emit methane and carbon dioxide--in some instances, even more than an equivalent fossil fuel installation.
https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn7046-hydroelectric-powers-dirty-secret-revealed/ [newscientist.com]
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 05 2017, @04:07PM (1 child)
That is BS because it does not release FOSSIL carbon. It is carbon neutral on human timescales, unlike burning fossil fuels.
This is because large amounts of carbon tied up in trees and other plants are released when the reservoir is initially flooded and the plants rot. Then after this first pulse of decay, plant matter settling on the reservoir’s bottom decomposes without oxygen, resulting in a build-up of dissolved methane. This is released into the atmosphere when water passes through the dam’s turbines.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by butthurt on Wednesday April 05 2017, @05:00PM
No, "carbon neutral" means there's no net addition of carbon to the atmosphere, either because there's none added in the first place, or because carbon is removed. However, with a hydroelectric scheme, there's no process taking carbon out of the atmosphere--not until the reservoirs are abandoned and vegetation regrows. That could take centuries. The distinction between fossil carbon and biomass is unimportant here: the methane and carbon dioxide behave just the same.
(Score: 2) by rondon on Thursday April 06 2017, @12:49PM
Why doesn't the article provide any support for the numbers that are thrown around willy-nilly? I agree with the initial premise - some foliage does rot when flooded, etc. However, the Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri was created in 1929, and there are still many, many trees in that lake that haven't decomposed. I find it extremely hard to believe that Fearnside's conclusions are correct, especially when all of his reasoning is locked behind a paywall.
This strikes me as FUD, plain and simple.