Green Wombat

photo: green wombat

Green Wombat is in Norway this week. Today is the Scandinavian country’s national holiday – commemorating its independence from Denmark in 1814 – and it seems the whole of Oslo is gathered at the Royal Palace (photo above) for the festivities. Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg recently declared a different sort of independence: "In the period up to 2050, Norway will undertake to reduce global greenhouse  gas emissions equivalent to 100 percent of our own emissions," he said in a speech last month. "This does not mean no emissions …. But it does mean that each tonne of greenhouse gases emitted is to be offset by an equivalent reduction elsewhere. This adds up to zero emissions." Norway finds itself in the particular situation of a country that obtains some 95 percent of its electricity from a renewable source – hydro power – yet is the world’s third-largest exporter of oil after Saudi Arabia and Russia. North Sea oil has made Norway exceedingly wealthy yet also fuels global warming. Stoltenberg was sketchy on the details of how Norway would become 100 percent clean and green. But his government has begun a project to develop carbon-capture technology for a natural gas plant, and Norway sequesters C02 from some North Sea gas production under the seabed. The country also offers significant tax breaks for electric cars – which makes the $92,000 Tesla Roadster an affordable car in this country. But maybe Norway will get some advice from the Governator: An Oslo newspaper yesterday reported that the Norwegian environment minister has invited Arnold Schwarzenegger to a climate change summit in August.