Total cost of ownership, social lifecycle cost and energy consumption of various automotive technologies in Italy

This paper estimates the total cost of ownership, social lifecycle cost and energy consumption of 66 cars with different fuel/powertrains available in Italy in 2013. The aim is to provide the various private and public decision makers with information that could allow them to better understand the current market penetration of the various automotive technologies and to predict the future one. It is found that the car operated by conventional fuels (gasoline, diesel) is currently the least expensive as far as the total costs of ownership are concerned. The bi-fuel lique fi ed petroleum gas (LPG) and the bi-fuel compressed natural gas (CNG) internal combustion engine vehicles are in the same price range. Both the battery electric vehicles (BEVs) and, especially, the hybrid ICEVs are more expensive. On the contrary, the social lifecycle costs of the BEVs are the lowest, thanks not only to their zero air pollutants' emissions in the use phase but also to their reduced noise emissions. The amount of the social costs relative to the total cost of ownership, estimated using recent European parameters, represents at the most 6% of the total cost. Consequently, even if the external costs were internalized, the alternative fuel vehicles would not become convenient for the fi nal consumer from a monetary point of view. Considering the energy consumption, with the 2011 Italian energy production mix, the BEVs and the diesel hybrid are the most energy ef fi cient cars. Focusing on 7 speci fi c models, and simulating realistic scenarios, it is found that the relative ranking of the BEVs in terms of total costs improves moderately when the traveled distance increases, subsidies are introduced and battery price drops. However, the BEVs become convenient only when the annual distance traveled is at least 20,000 km, a value much higher than the current Italian average and posing serious issues in terms of vehicles' range. Only a joint reduction of the battery price to V 240/kWh from initial estimated cost of V 412/kWh and the introduction of a subsidy would make the BEVs competitive with the current average Italian annual distance traveled.