External Costing in
Italy
External costs are the costs of social and
environmental damage that are not covered
by those doing the damage but are rather
paid by society at large. Amici della
Terra/FoE Italy has been studying the
external costs issue since 1996, paying
particular attention to the energy and
transport sectors. In 1997 we produced our
first report, in cooperation with small
independent electricity producers,
quantifying in monetary terms the
environmental advantages of a co-generation
programme to be implemented in Italy. Our
study compared this co-generation scheme
with energy production from traditional
power plants.
We next applied the methodology of
external costs to the transport sector
(road, rail and airplane). In 1997-98, in
cooperation with the Italian Railway, we
produced a report that addressed traffic
volumes in 1995. This work was presented to
the public during the government’s National
Conference on Transport, and the results
created quite some interest within the
government and parliament. For the first
time in Italy, our report evaluated
different kinds of environmental and social
damage according to common economic
criteria, thus allowing a more rational and
sustainable transport policy to be
developed.
The following year we produced a second
report, referring to 1997 traffic volumes.
The important factor this time was a
methodological connection with studies done
at the EU level. Ours was therefore the
first study to estimate the external costs
of transport in a given country, starting
with the marginal costs of specific
vehicles along specific routes. The report
took into account cutting-edge
epidemiological evidence and information
from leading scientific institutions.
In May last year, we presented a third
report on transport which covered
externalities related to production, use
and disposal in order to evaluate the full
lifecycle both of transport vehicles and of
auxiliary products (batteries, fuels,
lubricants, etc.). This research made it
necessary to study not only traditional
atmospheric pollutants but also the impacts
of different kinds of waste as well as
water use and pollution. This report also
created quite a stir, and its results were
published in the Italian institutional
reference publication "Conto Nazionale dei
Trasporti". The study demonstrates with
hard figures that the heavy externalities
of the transport system are mainly due to
private vehicle use. Indeed, for each
passenger kilometre, the production, use
and disposal costs of a car are twice those
of an airplane and three times those of a
train or bus.
The external cost evaluation methodology
developed by Amici della Terra is unique,
and deserves to be taken into account and
used at the domestic, international and
community levels.
Laura Radiconcini,
FoE Italy
