Increased awareness about environment among consumers and investors has compelled industries to focus on discharging their environmental responsibilities. The concept of environmental accounting has helped the industries in financially figuring out their environment-protection efforts. In this article an attempt has been made to draw tales from the available literature to present an overview about the concepts of environmental accounting at national as well as corporate levels. The need of environmental accounting and the concept of environmental costs and its categorization have been discussed.

The last two decades have witnessed greater awareness and concern for environment in India. The recent ruling of the Supreme Court that environmental education should be introduced as a mandatary subject in all courses is a testimony to the fact. "Environment" is a broad term. In general it is concerned with proper balancing of external factors viz. air water noise climate etc. which by interacting with each other keep an ecological balance. Deforestation contamination of water release of poisonous gases into air etc. leads to ecological imbalance. This has adverse effect on development of human and non-human resources of the society. Therefore the responsibility towards environment has become one of the crucial areas of social responsibility.

The business or industry an important part of the society is treated as a corporate citizen. The performance and acceptability of this citizen is esteemed and judged by costs and benefits created to the society. The developing countries like India are facing the twin problems of protecting the environment and promoting economic development (Chauhan 2005). Neither of these can be avoided. Therefore a trade-off between environmental protection and development is required.

The Accounting World Magazine, Environmental Accounting, Corporate Social Responsibility, Business Management, Gross Domestic Products, GDP, System of National Accounts, Financial Accounting Process, Management Accounting, Environmental Management System, Environmental Protection Agency, Decision-Making Process.