Exergetic analysis is derived from the First and Second Laws of thermodynamics is shown to be an excellent tool to analyse and characterize industrial processes. A coherent link to pinch technology is shown which allows the designer to extend design considerations to friction and equipment fabrication losses. Paths to extend the approach to other environmental factors are also indicated. Applications examples linked to Organic Rankine cycles, plaster drying or distillation of chemical products are briefly addressed. New perspectives opened by the so-called environomic optimization approach using recent progress in genetic algorithms are also briefly cited together with results from a cogeneration combined cycle case study.