Internalization of External Costs of Freight Transport

Accidents, global warming, congestion, air pollution and noise are examples of negative effects related to the transport activities that generate costs not fully borne by the transport users and hence not taken into account when they make a transport decision: these are the so called external costs. The internalization of the external costs of transport has been an important issue for transport research and policy development for many years worldwide. This Chapter, starting from an overview of the transport sector statistics and of transport external costs internalization in Europe, gives a taxonomy of the main transport external costs; moreover the state of art on the cost estimation methodologies is briefly introduced. A case study from the finished vehicle logistics in the automotive sector is presented. Results show the potential external costs reduction due to the better environmental and social performance assured by the modal shift from roads toward inland waterways transport.