Book excerpt: 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