Op-Ed: The World Lost A Stealth Eco-Monarch with the Passing of King Harald V

Norway's King Harald V died on August 28, 2026, at 89, ending a 35-year reign. His son now rules as King Haakon VIII. Beyond his personal warmth and decades of environmental advocacy, including about 20 years as president of WWF Norway, Harald's reign coincided with the fastest shift to electric vehicles of any developed economy: EVs made up under 1% of new car sales in 2010 and 97.6% by early 2026, with Norway's electric passenger car fleet passing one million vehicles that June. Tax breaks, toll discounts, and bus-lane access helped, but so did something harder to legislate: a monarch who couldn't endorse policy but could quietly drive electric cars himself and speak yearly about climate change as a matter of shared values rather than politics.

None of this affects your home directly, since Norway's incentives and grid (about 98% renewable, mostly hydropower) are specific to that country. But the piece uses Norway's steady, non-partisan approach as a contrast to recent U.S. policy swings, including the 2025 reconciliation bill that ended the $7,500 federal EV tax credit and cut home charger incentives, and accelerated phaseouts of solar and heat pump (a heating and cooling system that moves heat rather than burning fuel) credits that were meant to run for years longer.

The larger question raised is whether Norway's climate consensus continues under Haakon VIII, or whether it depended more than expected on one king's long consistency.