Process Economics

A primer for engineers, giving an overview of key facets of international process economics. The text covers market evaluation, shows how to estimate capital and operating costs, tackles project profitability and how to plan capacity.

USA. Textbook on cost accounting methodology for estimating profitability in manufacturing enterprises - covers capital costs, production costs, the time factor in capital flows, uncertainties in profitability estimates, etc., and includes elements of decision making. References.

This reference outlines the fundamental concepts and strategies for economic assessments for informed management decisions in industry. The book illustrates how to prepare capital cost and operating expense estimates, profitability analyses, and feasibility studies, and how to execute sensitivity and uncertainty assessments. From financial reports to opportunity costs and engineering trade-offs, Process Engineering Economics considers a wide range of alternatives for profitable investing and for projecting outcomes in various chemical and engineering fields. It also explains how to monitor costs, finances, and economic limitations at every stage of chemical project design, preparation, and evaluation.

Process Industry Economics: Principles, Concepts and Applications, Second Edition, explores the fundamentals of market evaluation, capital and operating cost estimation, and profitability evaluation, along with their implications for process technology evaluation, project development and investment decisions. Sections cover time dependent technology evolution in process plants, including scale development, performance improvement in new and operating plants, and learning related to environmental, safety and sustainability assessments. Influences on capital investment decisions, including capacity planning and environmental considerations are explored and supported by case studies. Finally, the aspects of overall industry performance and drivers are discussed. Outlines the basic principles of economic evaluation Identifies the roles of engineering, scientific, commercial and management personnel in contributing to economic evaluation Explores the interaction of economics with safety, environmental and sustainability criteria in project evaluation

Consists of original and rev. versions of papers presented at a conference at Airlie House in Virginia, Mar. 1983. Includes bibliographies and index.

Engineers often find themselves tasked with the difficult challenge of developing a design that is both technically and economically feasible. A sharply focused, how-to book, Engineering Economics and Economic Design for Process Engineers provides the tools and methods to resolve design and economic issues. It helps you integrate technical and economic decision making, creating more profit and growth for your organization. The book puts methods that are simple, fast, and inexpensive within easy reach. Author Thane Brown sets the stage by explaining the engineer’s role in the creation of economically feasible projects. He discusses the basic economics of projects — how they are funded, what kinds of investments they require, how revenues, expenses, profits, and risks are interrelated, and how cash flows into and out of a company. In the engineering economics section of the book, Brown covers topics such as present and future values, annuities, interest rates, inflation, and inflation indices. He details how to create order-of-magnitude and study grade estimates for the investments in a project and how to make study grade production cost estimates. Against this backdrop, Brown explores a unique scheme for producing an Economic Design. He demonstrates how using the Economic Design Model brings increased economic thinking and rigor into the early parts of design, the time in a project’s life when its cost structure is being set and when the engineer’s impact on profit is greatest. The model emphasizes three powerful new tools that help you create a comprehensive design option list. When the model is used early in a project, it can drastically lower both capital and production costs. The book’s uniquely industrial focus presents topics as they would happen in a real work situation. It shows you how to combine technical and economic decision making to create economically optimum designs and increase your impact on profit and growth, and, therefore, your importance to your organization. Using these time-tested techniques, you can design processes that cost less to build and operate, and improve your company’s profit.

This textbook includes discussions of such topics as the environment, the debt case, export-led industrialization, import substitution industrialization, growth theory and technological capability.