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The essential investments in new product development (NPD) made by industrial companies entail effective management of NPD activities. In this context, performance measurement is one of the means that can be employed in the pursuit of effectiveness.

This article surveys the literature dealing with theory and applications of life cycle costing (LCC). It deals with the literature published in the last 25 years and provides 667 references.

Defines life cycle costing, which gives rise to Life Cycle Cost (LCC). Defines LCC as “The total cost of the system or product under study over its complete life cycle or the duration of the period of study, whichever is the shorter”. Stresses that LCC can be used at whatever level is chosen (estate or, say, a boiler). Explains the timing and mechanism of measurement. Argues that the application of LCC at an early design stage will greatly enhance system design and operation. Offers other pertinent definitions.

The objective of this life cycle environmental cost analysis (LCECA) model is to include eco‐costs into the total cost of the products. Eco‐costs are both the direct and indirect costs of the environmental impacts caused by the product in its entire life cycle. Subsequently, this LCECA model identifies the feasible alternatives for cost‐effective, eco‐friendly parts/products. This attempts to incorporate costing into the life cycle assessment (LCA) practice. Ultimately, it aims to reduce the total cost with the help of green or eco‐friendly alternatives in all the stages of the life cycle of any product. The new category of eco‐costs of the cost breakdown structure includes eight eco‐costs, namely cost of effluent/waste treatment, cost of effluent/waste control, cost of waste disposal, cost of implementation of environmental management systems, costs of eco‐taxes, costs of rehabilitation (in case of environmental accidents), cost savings of renewable energy utilization, and cost savings of recycling and reuse strategies. Development of a suitable cost model and the identification of the feasible alternatives are performed simultaneously. Various checklists based on multiple environmental criteria will be used to ensure the eco‐friendly nature of the alternatives. On the basis of the calculated environmental impact indices (EII), priorities will be made for the selection of suitable alternatives. The mathematical model of LCECA aims to define the relationships between the total cost of products and the various eco‐costs concerned with the life cycle of the products, and determine quantitative expressions between the above‐said costs. A computational LCECA model has been developed to compare the eco‐costs of the alternatives. This model will include a break‐even analysis to evaluate the alternatives, and sensitivity analysis and risk analysis modules. This model aims at a cost‐effective, eco‐friendly product as an end result. This LCECA model will be compatible with the existing LCA software tools.

Reliability analysis is required to identify the components or subsystems with low reliability for a given designed performance. Life cycle cost analysis helps understand the cost implications over the entire life span of a product. The purpose of this paper is to present a case study describing reliability analysis and life cycle cost optimization of a band saw cutting machine manufactured and used in India.

The data required for reliability analysis is collected from the manufacturer and users of band saw cutting machine. The parameters of failure distribution have been estimated by using ReliaSoft’s Weibull++6 software. The life cycle cost is divided into various cost elements such as acquisition cost, operation cost, failure cost, support cost and net salvage value.

The results of the analysis show that the components such as band wheel bearing, guide roller bearing, limit switch, carbide pad, hydraulic cylinder oil seal, control panel dial, control panel and solenoid valve are critical from reliability and life cycle cost analysis perspective.

With certain design changes it is found that the reliability of the system is increased by 15.85 percent while the life cycle cost is reduced by 22.09 percent. The study also shows that the reliability analysis is useful for deciding maintenance intervals.

In recent years, fast urban expansion in China has stimulated rapid energy consumption growth and increased environmental pollution. Therefore, it is important to utilize clean and renewable energy in district heating for the sustainable urban development. This study aimed to investigate the environmental and economic impacts of one hot dry rock (HDR) geothermal energy-based heating system in a life cycle framework.

By using the input–output-based life cycle analysis model, the energy consumption, CO₂ emission and other pollutants of the HDR-based heating system were evaluated and then compared with those of other four heating systems based on burning coal or natural gas. The life cycle costs of the HDR-based heating system were also analyzed.

The results showed that using HDR geothermal energy for heating can significantly reduce fossil fuel consumption, CO₂ emission as well as environmental pollution, and its life cycle costs are also competitive.

This study not only evaluated the environmental and economic impacts of the HDR-based heating system in a life cycle framework but also provided a methodological life cycle assessment framework that can estimate both economic and environmental benefits, which can be used in policy making for China’s urban development.

Despite existing life cycle costing (LCC) method descriptions and practicable suggestions for conducting LCC analyses, no systematic analyses on actual implementations of LCC methods exist. This paper aims to review reports on LCC applications to provide an overview of LCC uses and implementation feasibility.

A review of LCC cases reported in academic and practitioner literature. Case reports were compared against one another and against the defining articles in the field.

Most of the reported LCC applications were far from ideal. Compared to the methods suggested in the literature many of the case study applications: covered fewer parts of the whole life cycle, estimated the costs on a lower level of detail, used cost estimation methods based on expert opinion rather than statistical methods, and were content with deterministic estimates of life cycle costs instead of using sensitivity analyses.

This review is limited to reported LCC applications only. Further research is encouraged in the form of a field‐based multiple‐case study to reveal context‐specific dimensions of LCC analysis and implementation challenges in more detail.

This review highlights the difficulty of conducting a reliable LCC analysis, and points out typical problems that should be carefully considered before drawing conclusions from the LCC analysis.

First systematic analysis of LCC applications that gives directions for further research on the LCC concept.

To provide an overview of research published in the management accounting literature on methods for cost management in new product development, such as a target costing, life cycle costing, component commonality, and modular design.

The structured literature search covered papers about 15 different cost management methods published in 40 journals in the period 1990–2013.

The search yielded a sample of 113 different papers. Many contained information about more than one method, and this yielded 149 references to specific methods. The number of references varied strongly per cost management method and per journal. Target costing has received by far the most attention in the publications in our sample; modular design, component commonality, and life cycle costing were ranked second and joint third. Most references were published in Management Science; Management Accounting Research; and Accounting, Organizations and Society. The results were strongly influenced by Management Science and Decision Science, because cost management methods with an engineering background were published above average in these two journals (design for manufacturing, component commonality, modular design, and product platforms) while other topics were published below average in these two journals.

The scope of this review is accounting research. Future work could review the research on cost management methods in new product development published outside accounting.

The paper centers on methods for cost management, which complements reviews that focused on theoretical constructs of management accounting information and its use.

Recently, there has been a shift toward the embodied energy assessment of buildings. However, the impact of material service life on the life-cycle embodied energy has received little attention. We aimed to address this knowledge gap, particularly in the context of the UAE and investigated the embodied energy associated with the use of concrete and other materials commonly used in residential buildings in the hot desert climate of the UAE.

Using input–output based hybrid analysis, we quantified the life-cycle embodied energy of a villa in the UAE with over 50 years of building life using the average, minimum, and maximum material service life values. Mathematical calculations were performed using MS Excel, and a detailed bill of quantities with >170 building materials and components of the villa were used for investigation.

For the base case, the initial embodied energy was 57% (7390.5 GJ), whereas the recurrent embodied energy was 43% (5,690 GJ) of the life-cycle embodied energy based on average material service life values. The proportion of the recurrent embodied energy with minimum material service life values was increased to 68% of the life-cycle embodied energy, while it dropped to 15% with maximum material service life values.

The findings provide new data to guide building construction in the UAE and show that recurrent embodied energy contributes significantly to life-cycle energy demand. Further, the study of material service life variations provides deeper insights into future building material specifications and management considerations for building maintenance.

The Hot Spot Analysis developed by the Wuppertal Institute is a screening tool focussing on the demand of reliable sustainability‐oriented decision‐making processes in complex value chains identifying high priority areas (“hot spots”) for effective measures in companies. This paper aims to focus on this tool.

The Hot Spot Analysis is a qualitative method following a cradle‐to‐cradle approach. With the examples of coffee and cream cheese hot spots of sustainability indicators throughout the entire life cycle are identified and evaluated with data from literature reviews and expert consultations or stakeholder statements. This paper focuses on the indicator resource efficiency as an example of how the methodology works.

The identified hot spots for coffee are the raw material procurement phase in terms of abiotic material, water and energy consumption, the production phase concerning biotic material and the energy consumption in the use phase. For cream cheese relevant hot spots appear in the raw material procurement phase in terms of biotic materials and water as well as biotic materials and energy consumption during the production phase.

Life cycle analyses connected to indicators like resource efficiency need to be applied as consequent steps of a Hot Spot Analysis if a deeper level of analysis is eventually aimed at which is more cost and time intensive in the short term. The Hot Spot Analysis can be combined with other sustainability management instruments.

Research and management can be directed to hot spots of sustainability potential quickly which pays off in the long term.

The paper shows that companies can address sustainability potentials relatively cost moderately.