Approach to the Monetary Evaluation of Externalities

Next to the further development of the externality framework methodologies, external cost estimations will be used within this integrated project to assess impacts from up- and downstream processes from LCA activities and be prepared for use in energy models. For this, a detailed coordination and fine tuning process with the involved research streams (1a for LCA analysis and 2a for modelling) is needed. Externality parameters and parameters of the LCA process should match; furthermore the need of models and LCA for averaged data on one hand and the loss of accuracy when averaging on the other hand, have to be balanced. New methods to incorporate nonlinear relationships between emissions and external costs in energy models have to be developed. It is finally worth noting that within NEEDS, the Impact Pathway Analysis (IPA) method developed in the ExternE project is further enhanced through:

The improvement of Atmospheric Modeling
The IPA. via soil and water
The examination of causal links between pollutants and health impacts
The assessment on biodiversity losses
The externalities valuation of the fuel extraction and transport phases

Moreover the geographical coverage of the current knowledge of energy externalities will be extended to additional countries (a group of New EU Member States and Newly Associated Countries, as well as some of Mediterranean Partner Countries like Egypt, Morocco, and Tunisia)