The radiant tube heating system has been widely applied to the furnaces which require isolatation of the heating atmosphere from the combustion atmosphere. However, the conventional system has a short life and it is difficult to reduce NOx emission when it is used at a high furnace temperature under high combustion load, because the fuel is burned in a small space. In order to solve this problem, we have studied the cause of radiant tube life by elastic-plastic creep analysis, and have made it clear that radiant tube life depends on the uniformity of the temperature distribution along the radiant tube. We have developed a new burner using a two-stage combustion method with exhaust gas self-recirculation. As a result, the life of the new system has been increased by a factor of two or more, and NOx emission has been reduced by 20% from previous levels. This paper presents an outline of the elastic-plastic creep analysis and the new burner, and describes the effect of its use on system life.