Abstract
This study applies the principles of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Life Cycle Costing (LCC) to fuel combustion process in the city of Turin. The analysis gives quantitative information about environmental impacts produced and provides a monetary value that should be compared to all benefits generated by transport.
LCC approach allowed to single out different kind of externalities; these are negative effects generated by someone and borne by someone else, without any compensation for damages. The study estimates that total external costs borne by Turin inhabitants is more than 600 thousand EUR / year (where up to 90% are costs on human health) compared to a fuel total expense of less than 300 thousand EUR / year. The external costs produced by one litre of generic fuel is about 1.7 EUR, a value very far from industrial prices or final ones (ready to be 200% greater).
The results concern petrol, green petrol (without Pb), diesel and GPL; even if the last one may seem the best alternative by the environmental point of view, his use is limited because of the actual difficulties in the refuelling. More attention should be paid on diesel: it could become a competitive alternative to petrol, if only there were more research work on ecodiesel and on new devices to control air emission, especially particulate air matter (PTS).
LCC, requiring different abilities and answering different needs (economic, technical, environmental and political), holds up the concept of sustainable development, providing an help to solve trade off between economic and environmental advantages. The life cycle approach is the only, at the moment, that manages to consider every aspect of a products life; coming up by the side of VIA (Valutazione Impatto Ambientale, Environmental Impacts Valuation), risk analysis and epidemiological studies, this study leads to a value that can be seen as the lower bound of the burden carried by urban traffic.
A brief review of intervention policies (economic, technical and administrative) is provided, trying to internalise the externalities that had been shown.