"If every oil exporter used some of their oil revenue to switch to EVs, that would, all things equal, hasten the transition to EVs."

The premise is all things aren't equal. The oil Norway would have used just gets used somewhere else so what difference does it make what Norway does instead. I don't know if that's the reality of the situation but if it is just an offset, it does sound like a bookkeeping trick doesn't it?

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blargey 12 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Norway switching from ICEs to EVs objectively reduces global oil consumption+burning by exactly that much.

Norway exporting oil increases oil supply, but doesn't increase consumption. The world's oil consumers are not supply-constrained; the producers are not running at 100% capacity, and they'll happily pick up the slack if Norway just stopped exporting oil for no reason. And there's a large amount of consumption that can't be offset by electrification in the first place (petrochemicals, long distance flight, etc) so there's not even a theoretical future end-state where they require a non-EV-using counterparty to buy their oil to fund their EV usage.

Calling it a "bookkeeping trick" is just verbal sleigh-of-hand.

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patmorgan23 11 hours ago | parent [-]

Increases in supply also increase consumption, we use lots of cheap stuff, but not very much of expensive stuff.

	▲	jonasdegendt 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		This would be true but you're not accounting for OPEC and other groups (e.g. historically the Texas Railroad Commission in the United States, not sure how relevant they still are) to balance production and price per barrel to what they think is agreeable. Oil hasn't been supply constrained since the 50's, it's price is largely based on what producing countries agree on, as well as geopolitics. Additionally, governments levy a decent amount of taxes on certain end products such as gasoline. They might very well, as they have in the past, decide to simply up their tax revenue as prices of crude and derivatives go down.

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paulryanrogers 12 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Only if Norway's lack of internal consumption must be met with equal and similarly destructive consumption elsewhere.

Consider if others followed their lead. Then oil would be used less for transportation, one of its most destructive and singular uses, and more for manufacturing or medical or less wasteful uses.