EU study of external costs of energy: What you pay with your flesh.

[NNadir]

The European Union has put together a study quantifying the external cost of different energy sources. By external costs, they mean the cost to the environment (greenhouse, mining damage etc), human health, damage to crops, and damage to material possessions such as works of art, structures, etc. These are not the costs you pay directly in fuel prices, these are the uncharged costs that you pay with your lungs, your children's future, the productivity of your country's land, your property and your aesthetic values.

The pdf file can be found here: http://www.externe.info/externpr.pdf

It is not surprising that wind energy has the lowest external cost for electrical generation. In most countries where such capacity is installed, the external cost of wind is only approached by either nuclear or hydro energy.

Only one country, Germany, had enough PV power installed to quantify its external costs. Surprisingly, even to me, the external cost of PV power in Germany is three times that of nuclear power (0.6 Euros/KW-Hr to 0.2 Euros/kW-hr).

France has the most varied energy equation. The lowest external cost in France belongs to nuclear energy (0.3 Eur/Kw-Hr.) Surprisingly, in France, hydro-electricity has an external cost over three times higher than nuclear (0.3Euro/kW-Hr compared to 1 Euro/kWhr.) It would seem that France doesn't do hydroelectric power very safely, although the cost may reflect overly sensitive ecosystems affected by hydroelectric power or some such thing. (I don't know this; I'm guessing.) Hydro does much better in most countries. Biomass in France has an external cost the same as hydro, three times higher than nuclear.

The external cost of biomass in Germany is 15 times the external cost of nuclear energy, possibly because of Germany's reliance on chemically intensive fertilization.

In one or two countries biomass does quite well, and is comparable to nuclear in some of the nuclear countries. In the Netherlands, biomass actually beats nuclear 0.7 Euros/kw-hr to 0.5 Euros/kw-hr.
The external cost of nuclear energy is the highest for the Netherlands of any country in the EU.

It seems like all of Europe could learn from the Norwegians (who are included in this study although they do not belong to the EU). Their external cost for biomass is 0.2 Euro/kw-hr. It is the only place in the EU where the cost for biomass is this low. This is probably because Norway has a significant business in processed wood products.

In the UK, the external cost of biomass to nuclear is greater by a factor of 4, 0.25 Euros/kw-hr for nuclear and 1 Euro/kw-hr for biomass.

Compared with any of the above-mentioned forms of energy, the report makes clear that oil and coal are vastly subsidized forms of energy with huge external costs. My opinion is that they should both be shut down as quickly as is possible, though I'm sure I'm just like Cassandra here: My predictions are correct but no one believes me.

This report is pretty much consistent with my particular bete-noire that it is very difficult to be an environmentalist and anti-nuclear power at the same time, the common perception to the contrary notwithstanding. I suspect nonetheless I will shortly be given all kinds of reasons why this study by the European Union is completely bogus. Fire away!