External costs of fossil electricity generation: Health-based assessment in Thailand

Songsak Sakulniyomporn, Kuskana Kubaha and Chullapong Chullabodhi

Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 2011, vol. 15, issue 8, 3470-3479

Abstract: Airborne pollutants from fossil fuel burning in electricity generation potentially contribute a number of consequent environmental impacts. In order to indicate the actual costs of energy, a so-called external cost has become of growing concerns internationally. This study aims to evaluate the external costs related to human health degradation resulting from Thai electricity generation produced from fossil fuel which operated during the period from 2006 to 2008. Impact Pathway Approach (IPA) was applied in the analysis. The advections of the criteria pollutants (SO2, NOX, and PM10) including secondary particulates (sulfate and nitrate aerosols) had been simulated using the CALMET/CALPUFF modeling system. Subsequently, the exposure-response functions (ERFs) were used to quantify the marginal damage to public health. Finally, costs of such damages were then estimated based on welfare economics. The results showed that the criteria pollutants caused significant damage to both premature mortality and morbidity. The average damage cost was totally about 600 million 2005 US$ annually which ranged between 0.05 and 4.17 US$ cent kWh−1 depending on fuel types. It implies that the external costs are significant to the determination of electricity market price. With the damage costs being included, the electricity price will reflect the true costs of the generation which will be beneficial to the society as a whole.

Keywords: External cost; Electricity externality; Impact pathway approach; Health impact; Air pollution (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (10)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364032111002073
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:rensus:v:15:y:2011:i:8:p:3470-3479

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/600126/bibliographic
http://www.elsevier. ... 600126/bibliographic

DOI: 10.1016/j.rser.2011.05.004

Access Statistics for this article

Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews is currently edited by L. Kazmerski

More articles in Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().