As Canada builds extra properties, cleaner supplies gained’t value extra—and would profit home industries: report

April 10, 2025

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TORONTO — As Canada strikes ahead with plans to construct hundreds of thousands of latest properties, the carbon emissions related to the supplies that make up homes and different main infrastructure are substantial. However a brand new Clear Vitality Canada report launched right this moment finds that constructing with lower-carbon supplies and strategies doesn’t have to make housing costlier—and even has the additional benefit of supporting Canadian industries at a time of excessive tariffs and commerce stress.

Manufacturing the development supplies that make up our buildings, from the concrete foundations to the drywall, creates important carbon air pollution. Assembly the earlier federal authorities’s housing plan (which might assist practically 4 million homes by 2030) was anticipated to generate the equal of greater than a yr’s price of Canada’s complete emissions by 2030.

Fortunately there are a selection of cleaner materials choices, lots of that are made in Canada, from metal produced in Electrical Arc Furnaces to low-carbon concrete mixes. This report appears on the value of utilizing these cleaner merchandise, discovering that lower-carbon equivalents can be found in Canada on the identical value or for a negligible value premium throughout virtually all constructing supplies and case research explored.

In a world the place the U.S. is an more and more unreliable buying and selling accomplice, selecting these lower-carbon supplies may also help scale up home industries, enabling them to grow to be extra aggressive exporters to different international jurisdictions, just like the EU, which might be searching for low-carbon merchandise.

There’s one key manner to assist arrange these industries for fulfillment, the report argues: “Purchase Clear” insurance policies, the place governments require that cleaner supplies are utilized in public development tasks. Through the use of this method in public procurement coverage, Canada might keep away from as much as 4 million tonnes of emissions by 2030 (the equal of 850,000 automobiles). Such a coverage can supply a trade-compliant path to supporting Canadian industries at a time of tariffs and uncertainty.

Head to the report for extra on why constructing clear properties and infrastructure doesn’t have to value the earth.

KEY FACTS

Materials emissions financial savings of as much as 32% for concrete, 100% for structural metal, 53% for rebar, 55% for drywall, and 98% for insulation had been recognized at no or negligible value will increase within the case research evaluation.
Extra environment friendly design of buildings can already scale back each value and carbon by decreasing the amount of development supplies wanted. Simplifying or streamlining constructing designs may also velocity up development.
The federal authorities has adopted insurance policies requiring concrete and metal utilized in federally procured tasks to be lower-carbon. Main development tasks funded by the federal authorities additionally require emissions discount of 30% throughout the entire challenge.
With constructing operations corresponding to heating and cooling getting electrified, the emissions from development will make up a bigger share. The embodied emissions of an environment friendly electrically heated constructing could make up as a lot as 93% of the constructing’s cumulative emissions impression by 2050.