A Future Growth Model for Building More Housing and Infrastructure with Less Embodied Greenhouse Gas

Global demand for housing and the climate crisis have created a seemingly impossible choice between the need to build more and the need to emit less from construction materials. Here, we present the future infrastructure growth (FIG) model, a generalizable method for finding pathways to build enough housing and infrastructure while reducing material emissions, in line with climate commitments. FIG uses open data to quantify the emissions of existing neighborhoods as if they were built new; it then uses these quantifications to forecast future cradle-to-gate embodied emissions from new residential buildings and linear infrastructure construction. This novel approach allows for detailed analysis that scales to a city, region, and/or national level and captures variability in construction norms, designs, and codes. We demonstrate FIG on Canada, using the model to find neighborhood-level drivers of embodied emissions and the most effective reduction strategies through 2030 and 2050. Current construction practices will cause a 437% overshoot of Canada's climate commitments if housing growth targets are met. Avoiding this overshoot requires a near-total reliance on multiunit buildings and best-in-class design supported by improvements in material manufacturing, building within existing urban boundaries, and halving the use of new materials.