Product Overview
What is Industry Economics Worldwide?
Industry Economics Worldwide is an annual subscription that delivers monthly data on the key cost drivers of manufacturing competitiveness across up to 33 countries.
Industry Economics Worldwide covers three interconnected data categories: industrial utilities prices and costs, plant construction cost indexes, and plant location factors. Together, these datasets let you assess how input costs — energy, water, construction labor, materials — differ across countries and evolve over time.
The product is built for professionals involved in the construction, operation, design, and evaluation of process plants. Concrete use cases include pre-evaluating a country's attractiveness for commodity manufacturing, assessing how utility costs affect production economics, adjusting plant capital cost estimates over time, converting CAPEX from one country to another, and supporting feasibility studies and investment analyses.
Subscriptions are sold on a per-country basis, starting at $149 USD per year. Data is updated monthly and delivered through Online Charts, and — on higher plans — Excel Add-In, Power BI, and a REST Web API.
Explore Industry Economics Worldwide
What types of data does this product provide?
Industry Economics Worldwide delivers three data categories: industrial utilities prices and costs, plant construction cost indexes, and plant location factors.
Industrial Utilities Prices and Costs — Monthly cost assessments for 10 key industrial utilities: Chilled Water, Cooling Water, Demineralized Water, Process Water, Compressed Air, Nitrogen, Oxygen, Hydrogen, Steam, and Carbon Monoxide. For each utility, up to three figures may be presented: on-site cash cost, off-site cash cost, and contract price. Cash costs reflect only the operating cost of running the utility system (excluding capital expenditure); contract prices include a return on capital as paid by an industrial customer.
Plant Construction Cost Indexes (IC Indexes) — Monthly indexes that measure how capital costs for building industrial plants have changed over time. They are normalized to a base of January 2000 = 100, so a value of 150 in a given month means construction costs have increased 50% from that baseline. Use them to escalate or de-escalate a capital cost estimate from one time period to another.
Plant Location Factors (IL Factors) — Monthly factors that compare the cost of constructing a plant in one country relative to another. Use them to convert a capital cost estimate developed for one country into an equivalent estimate for a different country.
All three data categories include 6-month short-term forecasts (Pro, Advanced, and Ultimate plans). Historical depth depends on the plan: 1 year (Starter), 3 years (Pro), 10 years (Advanced), 15 years (Ultimate).
How many countries are covered?
Industry Economics Worldwide covers 33 countries: United States, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Philippines, Poland, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, and United Kingdom.
The number of countries accessible depends on your plan. The Starter plan covers a single country of your choice. Pro, Advanced, and Ultimate plans allow access to data in multiple countries, up to the full set of 33.
What are plant location factors?
Plant location factors are monthly indexes that indicate how much more or less expensive it is to build an industrial plant in a given country compared to a reference location.
Plant location factors — also called IL Factors — are a practical tool for capital cost conversion. When you have a CAPEX estimate for a plant in one country and need to know what an equivalent plant would cost in another country, you divide the destination country's factor by the origin country's factor and apply that ratio to your estimate.
The factors are built from four parameter groups: local labor costs and productivity, material costs (primarily steel and energy), logistics costs (import duties, freight, and applicable taxes), and business environment conditions. Each component is weighted according to its relative significance in the total cost of constructing an industrial plant. The resulting factors are calculated monthly across all 33 covered countries, so they reflect current cost conditions rather than static benchmarks.
If your project CAPEX is estimated for the United States and you want to assess the equivalent cost in India, apply the ratio of India's IL Factor to the US IL Factor to scale your estimate to the Indian context.
What are plant construction cost indexes?
Plant construction cost indexes are monthly indicators that measure how the cost of building an industrial plant has changed over time in each covered country.
Plant construction cost indexes — also called IC Indexes — let you escalate or de-escalate a capital cost estimate from one point in time to another. If you have a CAPEX figure from five years ago and need to express it in today's terms, you apply the ratio of the current index value to the value at the original estimate date.
The indexes are compiled from the same four parameter groups used across the IEW methodology: labor costs and productivity, material costs (steel and key construction inputs), logistics, and business environment conditions. Each component is weighted by its significance in overall construction costs. The resulting series are normalized to a base period of January 2000 = 100, which means a current value of 180 indicates that construction costs are 80% higher than they were in January 2000.
Data is published monthly for all 33 covered countries.
A plant that cost $100 million to build when the IC Index was at 120 would cost approximately $150 million today if the current index is 180 — a 50% escalation over the same period.
Is a free sample available before I subscribe?
Free full trials are not offered, but free full samples are available for all three IEW data categories — no account or payment required.
Each full sample gives you access to the complete dataset for a selected country, including all product features, so you can evaluate the data quality, chart interface, and delivery options before committing to a subscription.
Full samples are available at:
- Utility Prices & Costs full sample
- Plant Construction Cost Indexes full sample
- Plant Location Factors full sample
In addition, 1-year historical data previews are available for every country covered — accessible directly from each product page without signing in.
How do I access my data after subscribing?
Your subscription becomes active as soon as payment is confirmed. Access is available immediately for credit card and PayPal payments; wire transfer payments typically take 3–5 business days to be identified, after which access is activated.
To access your data:
- Log in at www.intratec.us with your email and password (top menu).
- Click on "My Products" in the left menu.
- Click the subscription of interest on the right side to open it.
For the best experience, use Google Chrome or Firefox. JavaScript must be enabled. Internet Explorer is not supported.
Can I subscribe to data for a single utility only?
No. Industry Economics Worldwide subscriptions are not available for individual utilities or custom utility sets. When you subscribe, you select a plan and the countries you want covered — all 10 industrial utilities tracked by IEW are included for every country in your subscription.
If you only need data for a limited geographic scope, the Starter plan lets you begin with a single country at $149 USD per year, giving you access to all three data categories (utilities, construction cost indexes, and location factors) for that country.