Christoph Schreyer (Infras)
Christoph Schreyer (Infras)
External Costs of Transport and their Development in the Future
Abstract
External costs of transport for road and rail in Switzerland amount to 8.5 billion CHF for 2005 (Ecoplan/INFRAS, 2008). The following eleven cost categories have been covered within the update study: accidents, noise, health costs and building damage from air pollution, climate, nature and landscape, harvest losses, forest damage, soil damage, additional costs in urban areas, and up- and downstream processes.
In road transport the external costs in 2005 amount to CHF 8,074 million. Of this, 76% or CHF 6,134 million is attributable to passenger transport and 24% or CHF 1,941 million to freight transport. In rail transport the external costs amount to CHF 455 million. Compared with the previous calculations for the year 2000 the costs for road transport have increased from CHF 6,451 million to 8,074 million (+25%). The costs for rail transport have increased from CHF 417 million to 455 million (+9%). It should be noted that the cost increase is due in part to methodological adjustments, and not only to real changes. Most important reasons for the cost increase between 2000 and 2005 are the following:
› general: price adjustments, higher net production losses
› health costs: population growth and higher life expectancy
› noise costs: new noise database with high noise impacts of road transport
› climate change costs: higher CO2 avoidance cost factor due to new research results (4th IPCC assessment report, Stern report, etc.)
The future development of external costs depends on different factors:
› future development of vehicle fleets and emission patterns (reduction of air pollutants, stabilisation and/or reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, reduction of noise emissions)
› future development of road and rail safety
› future development with respect to life expectancy and population growth
› development of important cost factors like CO2 avoidance and damage costs
The
presentation will discuss qualitatively the impacts of each factor and show
tendencies of the future development of external costs of transport.
CV
1988-1991 business administration at the University of Cooperative Education in Stuttgart. 1991-1997 Master's Degree in environmental natural sciences at ETH [Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich], specialising in aquatic chemistry and material flow analysis/life cycle assessment; thesis on environmental risk assessment. Christoph Schreyer joined INFRAS in 1997and is senior project manager since 2006 in the transport area. His work focuses on transport planning (public transport services, forecasts), transport ecology and economics (external costs, cost-benefit analysis), and consulting for transport companies. From 1998 -2002, tutor at Natural and Social Science Interface (UNS) at the Department of Environmental Science, ETH.
