Construction’s Climate Footprint

The construction and the real estate sectors account for around 37% of global CO₂ emissions and nearly 50% of material extraction. With half of the buildings that will exist in 2050 yet to be built or renovated, investment decisions made this decade will determine whether the sector locks in high-carbon development or accelerates a transition to low-carbon, resilient, circular, and affordable buildings.

Why This Matters

The UNEP Global Status Report for Buildings and Construction 2025–2026 states that the construction and real estate sectors are est. 37% of global carbon emissions and consume nearly half of all materials extracted worldwide.

With buildings and construction responsible for roughly 37% of global emissions, the sector contributes around 13 to 14 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide every year. That is about 260 million metric tons of carbon emissions every week.

The amount of carbon dioxide released annually from the construction sector alone could provide enough electricity for 169 million households a year.

Details

When most people think about buildings and environmental impacts, they often focus on electricity use, heating, and cooling. Contrary to popular belief, a building’s climate footprint begins long before anyone walks through the door. Every ton of concrete, steel, glass, and aluminum carries emissions from extraction, manufacturing, transportation, all the way to installation.

To put into perspective the climate impact of the materials used in the construction process, we review the two most used materials in construction.

Concrete

Concrete is the most used material in construction and demonstrates the scale of the construction sector’s environmental impact. It is also the most widely used human-made material on Earth and forms the foundation of cities, transportation systems, bridges, and critical infrastructure.

Concrete’s key ingredient is cement. Cement production remains one of the largest sources CO₂ emissions, accounting for around 8% of global carbon emissions.

If cement production by itself was to be considered a country, cement production would be the world’s third or fourth largest emitter of CO₂, emitting 1.6 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide. 1.6 billion metric tons of carbon emissions would essentially be the equivalent amount of emissions from driving 1.6 billion gasoline cars for 5,000 miles. 5,000 miles is nearly the length of driving from New York to Los Angeles and back, so imagine 1.6 billion gasoline cars making that journey.

Steel

The second-most-used material in construction is steel, with construction using about 50% of all steel produced globally. Every year, the amount of steel produced would fill nearly 475,000 Olympic-sized swimming pools. While this may not be unexpected, what may surprise some is that the steel industry accounts for almost 10% of all global CO₂ emissions. Producing 1 metric ton of steel results in around 2 – 2.3 metric tons of CO₂ being emitted, so it would take over 100 trees growing for one year to capture the equivalent amount of carbon emitted from producing 1 metric ton of steel. Additionally, steel also consumes a large amount of coal, far beyond any other building material. The steel industry itself accounts for 14% of total global coal consumption.

Industry View

The World Green Building Council’s research on embodied carbon highlights that reducing emissions from construction materials is one of the most important challenges facing the building sector. This challenge exists across these three most used materials, but also in many others. Aluminum requires significant electricity inputs. Glass, insulation, plastics, and other construction products all carry their own climate costs. In a nutshell, a building can generate significant locked-in climate emissions before it ever consumes a single kilowatt-hour of electricity.

The scale of resources required to build the modern world is equally staggering. Humans extract more than 100 billion metric tons of materials every year. To further contextualize this, the Eiffel Tower weighs around 10,100 metric tons. To visualize the amount of materials extracted annually, imagine the sheer size and grandeur of the Eiffel Tower. The world extracts enough resources annually to equate to almost 10 million Eiffel Towers. Extraction of materials continues to increase and while much of that material ultimately becomes the buildings and infrastructure that define modern civilization, this can result in large environmental implications in the near future.

Call to Action

A new building is not created from nothing and all building parts must come from somewhere. A construction project consists of enormous volumes of extracted resources, carbon-emitting vehicles, energy consumption, and decades of future environmental consequences.

Thus, the construction and the real estate sectors must solve for five risks to account for the sectors’ 37% of global CO₂ emissions and nearly 50% of material extraction.