Norway's inflation rate rose to 3.0 percent in July, and Statistics Norway puts the whole of the increase on electricity and grid rent
Seven point three percent, in a single month.
That is what electricity including grid rent did to Norwegian consumer prices between June and July, and it is very nearly the whole story of the month. The consumer price index rose 3.0 percent against July 2025, Statistics Norway published on Monday morning, up from 2.7 percent in June. The agency puts the contribution of electricity and grid rent to that increase at 0.3 percentage points. The increase was 0.3 percentage points.
On the month the index rose 1.0 percent.
Why one line moved that far
Espen Kristiansen, a head of section at the agency, is quoted in the release attributing the move to two things at once: an announced rise in grid rent at several of the largest network companies, and price growth in every electricity price zone except the north. His remarks are in Norwegian and appear here in indirect speech.
The base did the rest. Electricity including grid rent was 2.3 percent cheaper in July 2025 than it had been that June, and 7.3 percent dearer this July than this June. Statistics Norway says the twelve-month rate for the group therefore rose by almost ten percentage points between one release and the next.
Food is now growing at 0.9 percent, and not because it got cheaper
Food prices rose 3.1 percent from June to July.
The annual rate for food nonetheless fell to 0.9 percent, which the agency says is the first reading below 1.0 percent since March 2022. Both facts are the same fact seen from different ends: over the same weeks of 2025 food prices rose 4.6 percent, so a smaller July increase this year pulls the twelve-month figure down. July is the month the Norwegian grocery trade phases in its price changes, and Kristiansen notes that growth from June to July was still relatively high this year despite signals from the trade that it would like to stop doing this.
Pears, salmon, trout and other fresh fish and canned meat were among the largest risers on the month. Assorted fruit, vegetables and cocoa products fell.
The wider division reported in the English tables, food and non-alcoholic beverages, ran slightly higher on both measures, at 3.2 percent on the month and 1.1 percent on the year.
The holiday month behaved like one
Ferry fares rose 12.8 percent between June and July. Kristiansen attributes that to summer tariffs introduced this year on more crossings, including some that had previously been free, and notes the starting level was low.
Air fares rose 11.2 percent on the month, the same rate as between May and June. In the equivalent month of 2025 they rose 3.7 percent, which leaves them 2.9 percent above July last year. Package holidays rose 2.2 percent this July after falling 3.5 percent last July, and their twelve-month rate moved up 5.8 points on that alone.
The number underneath did not move, and a third number is stranger
CPI-ATE, which excludes energy and holds tax changes constant, rose 2.7 percent on the year. That is the same rate as June, and the agency says one has to go back to January 2025 to find it before that. On the month it rose 0.8 percent.
Then there is CPI adjusted for tax changes, printed in the same table, which rose 4.6 percent over the twelve months. It differs from the headline index in one respect: it holds real changes in indirect taxes out of the calculation. The two series are 1.6 percentage points apart. The release does not say which tax changes account for the gap, and this item will not guess at them.
The document
Statistics Norway published the July index on 10 August. The release carrying the detail is in Norwegian; an English edition of the same release carries the two headline rates, and the statistics page carries the full division table and the weights in English.
