WP 2000: Evaluation Frame and Socio-economic Cost-Benefit Analysis
This work package plays a key role in the assessment process. It is responsible for guiding the assessment work throughout the project and for working out cost-benefit figures for the Intelligent Vehicle Safety Systems which have been selected in advance in WP 1000. Objectives of the work package - which are also reflected in the task structure - are:
- Provide a sound and comprehensive socio-economic impact assessment framework, in particular, a frame which also integrates appropriate methods for stakeholder analyses,
- Provide a database for safety and traffic performance on EU-25 level as general input for the evaluation of particular systems,
- Determine cost-benefit results as society welfare based indicator for different IVSS,
- Test the sensitivity of the results by modifying important variables in the cost-benefit calculations (e.g. market penetration rates).
The work package can build on the methodological foundations which have been developed in the SEiSS study (Exploratory Study for the Potential Socio-Economic Impact Assessment of Intelligent Safety Systems in Road Vehicles) for the European Commission. This methodology serves as a basis for the tasks in this work package and the whole eIMPACT project in general.
Based on the existing methods the enlarged framework for socio-economic impact assessment will be specified. In its core it will rely on cost-benefit analysis which represents the most prominent economic assessment tool to prove the profitability of a measure on society level. Cost-benefit ratios can be derived from comparing the potential costs for the society to implement a particular system to the potential benefits which accrue in terms of e.g. accident and time cost savings for users, other traffic participants and the general public. If the benefits exceed the costs (benefit-cost ratio is above 1) then the system is profitable from the society point of view.
It is key objective of the work package to carry out a comprehensive cost-benefit analysis for a number of stand-alone and co-operative Intelligent Vehicle Safety Systems. These results will form the basis for the development of a future European IVSS roll-out strategy. Ideally, the awareness and the willingness-to-pay of the users will be strengthened and the interests of the industry to produce those systems and bring them onto the market will be increased. However, since the profitability proof on society level does not guarantee a successful deployment of a system, the analysis on society level will be complemented by stakeholder analyses which provide information about the economic consequences of system deployment for different groups such as users, OEM and suppliers, insurance companies and the public administration. The analyses on society level will be also enlarged by investigating wider economic impacts (the role of IVSS concerning the stimulation of growth and employment in the European Union) and distributive aspects (which societal groups profit most from IVSS deployment?). The methodological foundations for the enlargement of the assessment framework will be laid down in this work package whereas stakeholder analyses for particular IVSS will be object of a subsequent work package (WP 5000).
The work package is strongly related to the impact analyses (WP 3000) because it specifies the methodology of socio-economic impact assessment and the information needs. Furthermore, the output of impact analyses serves as an input for the cost-benefit analyses and the further steps of socio-economic impact assessment. Furthermore, the cost-benefit results will also play an important role in working out policy options for facilitating the market introduction of Intelligent Vehicle Safety Systems (WP 4000).