New Energy Externalities Developments for Sustainability (NEEDS)

The NEEDS consortium included 66 partners, representing 26 Countries (12 Member States from the EU15, 9 new EU Member States, 3 Mediterranean Countries, and 2 Countries from other parts of the World). The ultimate objective of the project was to evaluate the full costs and benefits (i.e., direct and external costs) of energy policies and of future energy systems, both for individual countries and for the enlarged EU as a whole. It entailed major advancements, specifically in the areas of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and external costing associated with energy production, transport, conversion and use, and it improved the integration of these research areas into policy formulation.