Environmental Cost Accounting of Material Flows During Their Technological Transformation

Abstract

The paper presents selected outputs of the scientific research activities of its authors in the field of implementation, intensification, and standardization of environmental management systems for technological enterprise practice. Aspects of environmental-economic continuity were examined in assessing technological inputs in the form of cost accounting for material and energy flows and the level of environmental quality of transformation processes in the input-output enterprise system. On the basis of these aspects, a model for accounting for the costs and revenues of individual processes was proposed and standardised. The methodological approach to cost accounting consists of ten key elements arranged in Deming’s cycle of continuous improvement with a closer specification of their purpose, function, and content. The basis for modelling and quantifying material and energy flows is the determination of input/output points, processes, and the determination of quantification nodes for evaluation in physical and monetary units. For each quantity node, costs for the system and waste management must also be quantified. Energy costs, system costs, and waste management costs are divided into product and material losses from production cost data for each quantity node. Summarisation and integrated presentation of cost data were proposed to utilize cost matrices and Sankey diagrams. Further benefits of using environmental cost accounting for material-energy flows in production were also specified.