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This report systemically compares all kinds of external costs and benefits of different electricity generating technologies. Environmental effects, employment and production effects, the depletion of natural resources and different kinds of public subsidies are all considered. Electricity production based on fossil fuels and nuclear energy is compared to electricity production with wind energy and photovoltaic systems. The impact of including the substantial external effects in the electricity prices on the competitive position of different energy technologies is analyzed. It is shown that the present allocation process is seriously distorted resulting in sub-optimal investment decisions concerning competing energy technologies. For the first time this book carries through the theoretically discussed idea of external effects of energy systems not only to the quantification of different kinds of external effects but analyzes the consequences for the choice of competing electricity generating technologies. The analysis shows that renewable energy sources are at a serious competitive disadvantage as long as external costs are not taken into consideration. The introduction of wind energy systems on a broad scale may be delayed up to fifteen years. This results in considerable costs to society. The book suggests possible corrective actions

This paper presents the results of research on the total costs to society of different technologies for electric power production in the Federal Republic of Germany. The analysis views electricity costs from a macroeconomic perspective and includes the internal or private costs as well as the social costs. The focus is on fossil and nuclear fuels as conventional energy sources on the one side and on wind and photovoltaic electricity as examples of renewable energy sources on the other.

The knowledge about the special structures and basic ideas of the national policies on air pollution control constitutes the precondition for an international consensus on the policy on air pollution. Therefore all important fields have been collected for the 12 OECD countries Belgium, Federal Republic of Germany, France, Great Britain, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Canada, Austria, Sweden, Switzerland and USA. The aspects also include the strategies of the individual countries. Clear differences become evident when immission and emission standards are set up, and when principle of prevention resp. the polluter-pays-principle is applied. The strictest regulations are enforced in the Federal Republic of Germany, Switzerland, Sweden and Austria.