Karmøy

Karmøy kommune
Municipality
View of the Låvesundet
Coat of arms Rogaland within Norway
Karmøy within Rogaland
Coordinates: 59°15′23″N 05°14′57″E / 59.25639°N 5.24917°E / 59.25639; 5.24917Coordinates: 59°15′23″N 05°14′57″E / 59.25639°N 5.24917°E / 59.25639; 5.24917
Country	Norway
County	Rogaland
District	Haugaland
Administrative centre	Kopervik
Government
• Mayor (2015)	Jarle Nilsen (Ap)
Area
• Total	229.90 km2 (88.76 sq mi)
• Land	219.43 km2 (84.72 sq mi)
• Water	10.47 km2 (4.04 sq mi)
Area rank	315 in Norway
Population (2015)
• Total	42,062
• Rank	20 in Norway
• Density	191.7/km2 (497/sq mi)
• Change (10 years)	12% %
Demonym(s)	Karmøybu Kartabu
Time zone	CET (UTC+1)
• Summer (DST)	CEST (UTC+2)
ISO 3166 code	NO-1149
Official language form	Neutral
Website	www.karmoy.kommune.no
Data from Statistics Norway

Karmøy is a municipality in Rogaland county, Norway. It is located southwest of the city of Haugesund in the traditional district of Haugaland. The administrative centre of the municipality is the town of Kopervik.

Karmøy is one of the largest municipalities in the region with over 42,000 people. It is known for its industries, as well as for fishing. Karmøy is also well known in Norway for its beautiful heather moors and the white sand surfing beaches.

Most of the municipality lies on the island of Karmøy. The island is connected to the mainland by the Karmøy Tunnel and the Karmsund Bridge.

The municipality of Karmøy is a recent creation. It was created as a new municipality on 1 January 1965 upon the merger of two towns and parts of five municipalities into one large municipality. The merger was instigated by the findings of the Schei Committee. Karmøy was the result of merging the towns of Kopervik and Skudeneshavn plus the neighboring municipalities of Skudenes, Stangaland, Åkra, and most of Avaldsnes and Torvastad. Initially, the municipality had 23,217 residents.

The municipality was named after the island of Karmøy, on which the majority of the municipality is located. The Old Norse form of the name was Kǫrmt. The name is probably derived from karmr which means "bargeboard" (here in the sense "the sheltering island"). The last element in the word, øy, means "island" and was added later.