An environmental assessment and a cost analysis were conducted for mobility options using electricity, hydrogen, ethanol, Fischer-Tropsch diesel and methane derived from wood. Therefore, the overall life cycle with regard to greenhouse gas emissions; acidifying emissions and fossil energy demand as well as costs is analysed. The investigation is carried out for mobility options in 2010 and gives an outlook to the year 2030. Results show that methane utilization in the car is beneficial with regard to environmental impacts (e.g. 58.5 g CO2-eq./km) and costs (23.1 (sic)-ct./km) in 2010, especially in comparison to hydrogen usage (132.4 g CO2-eq./km and 63.9 (sic)-ct./km). The electric vehicle construction has high environmental impacts and costs compared to conventional vehicles today, but with technical improvements and further market penetration, battery electric vehicles can reach the level of concepts with combustion engines in future applications (e.g. cost decrease from 38.7 to 23.4 (sic)-ct./km). (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.