High embodied carbon, a housing shortage, and billions of tons of wasted biomass reveal a missed opportunity to build smarter and cleaner.
June 23, 2025
By Lillian Mercho, Chris Magwood
The problem
The US housing and construction sectors are at an urgent crossroads. Each year, building new homes generates an estimated 55 to 80 million tons of embodied carbon emissions — roughly equivalent to the total annual emissions of entire countries like Norway, Hungary, and Austria. At the same time, the country is grappling with a severe housing shortage, with a deficit estimated between 1.5 and 7.3 million homes.
Yet while emissions rise and demand grows, an overlooked opportunity is is piling up in plain sight: the United States produces over 1.1 billion tons of underutilized biomass every year from farms, forests, and landfills, much of which currently has little to no market value and, in many cases, poses environmental risks when left to decompose or is burned.
Our latest report, Building with Biomass: A New American Harvest, shows how this trio of challenges — high embodied carbon, a housing shortfall, and underused biomass — sets the stage for a new approach to climate-smart, resource-efficient building.
Read the rest of the article at rmi.org.
Lillian Grace Mercho 