Fossil fuels like coal, natural gas, and oil account for a significant percentage of the total fuel use of the world. Costs associated with the use of fossil fuels can be classified into two types - hidden cost and explicit cost. Hidden costs are those costs, which do not show up in the utility bills of consumers and as a result, consumers can easily avoid paying the hidden costs of fossil fuels. The explicit costs on the other hand, are paid off at regular intervals in the form of different utility bills like purchase price of fossil fuels, electricity bills, and the like. The explicit costs of using fossil fuels include labor costs for oil drilling, coal mining, transportation costs, cost of building energy-producing plants, and many more.
More on Hidden Cost of Fossil Fuels
The hidden costs of fossil fuels are also termed as negative externalities arising out of dependency on fossil fuels. These costs give rise to a number of health hazards and adverse climatic changes.
The hidden costs of fossil fuels have serious impact on the fossil fuel consumers and also on the society as a whole. Use of fossil fuels results in the emission of harmful greenhouse gases thereby adding to the problem of air pollution. Coal mining causes severe damage to land. Black lung disease is very common among the laborers who work in mines.
Environmental degradation resulting from hidden cost of fossil fuels occurs in different forms like acid rain, global warming, land and water pollution, air pollution, and thermal pollution.
Sulfur oxides and Nitrogen oxides produced from burning fossil fuels are two major components of acid rain. These oxides produce sulfuric acid and nitric acid once they come in contact with water vapor in atmosphere. Acid rain makes water bodies too acidic for sustenance of aquatic animals and plants. It also damages crops and lands.
Global warming is another adverse impact of hidden cost of fossil fuels. The increased concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and the resulting global warming have brought about a number of unfavorable changes like melting of glaciers, rising of sea levels, inundation of river deltas, low-lying lands and wetlands. Frequency of droughts has increased in the inland zones as a result of global warming.
The hidden costs of drilling, transportation, and usage of oil result in severe water pollution. Oil spills is one of the major reasons behind the loss of aquatic animals and plants living in waterways and shorelines. Thermal pollution resulting from excessive use of fossil fuels also causes severe damage to aquatic ecosystem.
Conclusion
Unlike explicit cost, the hidden cost of fuels is not easy to find out. These costs are excluded from the energy pricing system. Consumers of fossil fuels always evade paying for hidden costs of fossil fuels. There is no denying that hidden cost of fossil fuel is detrimental to the society as a whole. It is the responsibility of the consumers to reduce their dependence on fossil fuels so that the hidden costs of fossil fuels could be restricted to the bare minimum.