Lucie Rychla
July 15th, 2016

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Alternativet, the young Danish green party, has proposed to stop the import of diesel and petrol vehicles into Denmark by 2025.

Instead, the party suggests electric cars should slowly replace polluting fossil fuel cars.

To meet climate targets
Rasmus Nordqvist, the spokesman for Alternativet, contends this move is necessary for a green transformation of the transport sector if Denmark is to meet its climate targets.

According to Nordqvist, the Danes would still be allowed to keep and even resell their old petrol and diesel cars after 2025, but imports and sales of new ones would be banned.

Alternativer also proposes that electric cars should be exempt from the registration tax and the infrastructure for electric cars should be improved, so that the Danes could easily adapt to the use of these green vehicles.

READ MORE: Electric car sales plummet in wake of registration tax

A total “nonsense”
Thomas Møller Thomsen, the executive manager at the Federation of Danish Motorists, has called the proposal a “nonsense”.

“To ban the cars would be the same as prohibiting people to go to work. Cars are indispensable to the Danes for carrying out their everyday chores,” Thomsen told TV2.

READ MORE: Denmark among first EU nations to sign Paris climate deal

More options possible
Gunni Mikkelsen, the administrative manager at the Danish Car Importers Association, is open to talks about the import of more environment-friendly cars, but said “there are many different ways we can reduce CO2 emissions in cars” than just focusing on electric cars.

Niels Buus Kristensen, a transport researcher and a member of the Climate Council, has emphasised that Denmark needs to radically reduce CO2 emissions in the transport sector if the country wants to meet the UN climate targets.

At the Paris climate change conference last November, Denmark agreed to reduce carbon dioxide emissions below 1990 levels by 2030.