The cement production is one of the most energy-intensive industries with huge amount of CO2 emissions. In this paper, extended exergy analysis is employed to explore a typical cement production chain in China. The cumulative exergy consumption (CExC), capital and labor exergy, and environmental remediation exergy are calculated to quantify the real ecological cost of cement production and the specific sectors with exergy losses are identified. Moreover, three scenarios including carbide slag substitution, corn straw substitution and waste heat recovery are set up to examine the potential improvement of the traditional cement production with detailed comparison of extended exergy components. In the carbide slag substitution scenario with three substitution percentages, the total extended exergy, CEXC conversion efficiency and exergy loses change little. In the corn straw substitution scenario under three substitution scenarios, the CExC conversion rates are slightly improved while the exergy loses are notably decreased. The CExC conversion efficiency of the waste heat recovery scenario is almost the same due to the extra capital investments on kilns and power generation units. The results may provide useful suggestions for upgrade of cement industry in an integrated perspective of energy efficiency and socioeconomic and environmental costs. (C) 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.