Final answer:
Appraisal costs refer to the expenses incurred to detect and remove defective products before shipment, ensuring they meet quality standards. These costs involve testing, inspections, and quality audits. Appraisal costs are crucial for maintaining high product quality and sustainability by reducing wastage and emphasizing repairability.
Step-by-step explanation:
The best definition of appraisal costs with respect to quality is b) Costs incurred to detect and remove defective products before shipment. Appraisal costs are part of the quality costs or cost of quality in business and manufacturing. These costs generally include expenses associated with measuring, evaluating, and auditing products to ensure they meet quality standards before reaching the customer. This could involve testing, inspection of materials, products, and production processes, quality audits, and supplier quality evaluations.
When relating the concept to the provided information, mathematical models in business could be utilized to estimate these appraisal costs, which can help a business in planning and decision-making processes. In a scenario where goods become more durable and designed for longevity and repairability, appraisal costs could also increase as the focus shifts to maintain high quality over a product's extended lifetime, ensuring every sold item continues to meet stringent quality standards. The connection to environmental sustainability is evident, as a reduction in waste through improved quality and increased repairability aligns with lowering the environmental impact of production and disposal.