The Standard

Since publication of the first edition in July 2017, the International Cost Management Standard (ICMS) has provided a single methodology for reporting, grouping and classifying construction project costs.

In response to industry feedback following the publication of the first edition of ICMS, the ICMS Coalition updated the standard in 2019 to incorporate life cycle costs. The second edition enabled practitioners to classify costs across the whole project life cycle, eliminating inconsistencies and discrepancies when accounting, comparing and predicting project finances.

In 2021, recognising the importance of reducing carbon emissions in construction, the ICMS Coalition developed the third edition. This provides a common reporting framework allowing the interrelationship between construction costs and carbon emission to be explored. The third edition provides the opportunity to make decisions about design, construction, operation, and measurement of the built environment that optimise environmental sustainability.

In addition, it extends the number of civil engineering Projects or Sub-Projects to include ‘Offshore structures’, ‘Near shore works’, ‘Ports’, ‘Waterway works’, and ‘Land formation and reclamation’.