The Dutch parliament recently accepted a motion that all new cars sold in the Netherlands from 2025 and on have to be sustainable.
That means that in nine years from now no gasoline- or diesel-powered cars would allowed to be sold in the Netherlands, making electric vehicles the only option.
The idea came from the Dutch labour party PvDA. Despite the fact that the motion was vehemently opposed by the right-wing VVD, it passed and the cabinet is now tasked with coming up with a viable plan to make it reality.
While the VVD calls the plan unrealistic, PvDA leader Diederik Samsom thinks it’s a feasible proposal because of the rapid development of new technologies and innovations. He also cited the fact that other countries are ahead of the Netherlands in this area.
Earlier the PvDA already called for banning the sale of gasoline- and diesel-powered cars within 14 years, a plan that was supported by D66, GroenLinks, ChristenUnie, SP, Kuzu/Öztürk, Klein and Houwers.
The Dutch labour party wants the Netherlands to follow the example of Norway, which has the largest fleet of electric vehicles per capita in the world.
They envision a Netherlands with exclusively electric cars, about eight million of them. The larger idea of a sustainable Dutch society is that the car batteries will provide homes with power when renewable sources such as wind turbines don’t produce energy.