Sustainable transport infrastructure charging and internalisation of transport externalities

The objective of this project was to assess to what extent EU Member States and selected other countries (i.e. Norway, Switzerland, United States, Canada and Japan) have implemented the ‘user-pays’ and the ‘polluter-pays’ principles in their transport policy. It provides an overview of the progress EU Member States have made towards the goal of full internalisation of external and infrastructure costs of transport and to identify approaches for further internalisation.

The main findings of this project are presented in the report shown on the right side of this page. More detailed results of the project can be found in four separate deliverables:

• Overview of transport infrastructure expenditures and costs
  This deliverable provides and overview of the infrastructure costs of all transport modes and countries.
• Handbook on external costs of transport – version 2019
  This deliverable provides and overview of the methodologies and input values that can be used to provide state-of-the-art estimates for all main external costs of transport. Furthermore, the deliverable presents the total, average and marginal external costs for all transport modes and countries.
• Transport taxes and charges in Europe – An overview of economic internalisation measures applied in Europe
  This deliverable provides an overview of the structure and level of transport taxes and charges applied for the various transport modes. Furthermore, this study presents the total revenues from transport taxes and charges for the various transport modes and countries.
• The state of play of internalisation in the European transport sector
  This deliverable shows the extent to which external and infrastructure costs are internalised by current taxes and charges for all countries and transport modes. It also investigates recommended options for further internalisation.

Associated deliverable:

Sustainable Transport Infrastructure Charging and Internalisation of Transport Externalities: Main Findings