the perception that there was a need for the study of the full or external costs of electricity generation beyond its plantlevel production costs was very much motivated by concerns about the external cost of air pollution while in the meantime climate change risks have assumed comparable importance the costs of air pollution remain a top priority in the planning and regulation of sustainable electricity systems these emissions arise during the combustion of fossil fuels coal oil gas or biomass that impact primarily the respiratory system leading to bad health morbidity or premature death mortality economics has long attempted to monetise these impacts by assessing an individual s marginal willingness to pay for marginal changes in the probability of incurring mortality risk from which the notion of the value of a statistical life vsl can be derived methodologies for monetising morbidity damages also exist but are less stabilised