External costs of electricity production, 1990 and 2005 — low and high estimates

The external costs in the above two figures are based on the sum of three components associated with the production of electricity: costs of damage caused by climate change damage associated with emissions of CO2; damage costs (such as impacts on health, crops etc) associated with other air pollutants (NOX, SO2, NMVOCs, PM10 and NH3), and other nonenvironmental social costs for nonfossil electricity-generating technologies. The external costs from the nuclear industry have to be treated with caution, as only some externalities are included. The costs reflect, to a large extent, the small amount of emissions of CO2 and air pollutants, and the low risk of accidents. There is a clear need for new estimates of the damage cost factors for nuclear energy associated with future ExternE projects.