08/12/2025
Can you guess how much higher the emissions of this school and sports hall in Myrskylä would have been, if they were built with reinforced conrete instead of timber?
✅ The answer is 40% higher.
Although the direct costs of wood construction are slightly higher than those of concrete, the picture changes when environmental impacts are assigned a monetary value. According to a new study, wood is clearly a more cost-effective building material when emissions are monetized.
Our researchers Oana Iliescu, Ali Amiri and Seppo Junnila calculated the direct costs and emissions of the timber school construction and compared them to a concrete alternative. The valuations were based on scientific estimates of the harm emissions cause to human health, ecosystems, and the economy — and what this damage costs society.
"If public procurement were to make visible the hidden costs, the use of wood products as construction materials would appear as a far more attractive option,” Iliescu says.
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