Wooden multi-storey construction market development – systematic literature review within a global scope with insights on the Nordic region

Abstract

Climate change sets high pressures on the construction industry to decrease greenhouse gas emissions. Due to the carbon storage properties and potential to use renewable resources efficiently, wooden multi-storey construction (WMC) is an interesting alternative for the construction industry to enhance sustainable development combined with the aesthetic and well-being benefits of wood perceived among many consumers. For forest industry firms, industrial wood construction is a possibility to seek for business opportunities and bring socio-economic benefits for local economies. Despite positive drivers, WMC still remains a niche even in the forest-rich countries.The purpose of our study is to add understanding on the WMC market development by conducting a systematic literature analysis on international peer-reviewed studies from the past 20 years. Our special focus is on the role of WMC in the housing markets studied from the perspectives of the demand, supply and local governance factors. As specific aims, we 1) synthesize the key barriers and enabling factors for the WMC market growth; 2) identify the actors addressed in the existing studies connected to the WMC market development, and 3) summarize research methods and analytical approaches used in the previous studies. As a systematic method to make literature searches in Web of Science and Scopus for years 2000–2020, we employed PRISMA guidelines. By using pre-determined keywords, our searches resulted in a sample of 696 articles, of which 42 full articles were after selection procedure included in-depth content analysis. Our results showed cost-efficiency gains from industrialized prefabrication and perceived sustainability benefits by consumers and architects enabled a WMC market diffusion. The lack of experiences on the WMC, and path dependencies to use concrete and steel continue to be key barriers for increased WMC. Although our research scope was the global WMC market development, most of the literature concerned the Nordic region. The key actors covered in the literature were businesses (e.g., contractors, manufacturers and architects) involved in the wood construction value-chains, while residents and actors in the local governance were seldomly addressed. Currently, case studies, the use of qualitative data sets and focus on the Nordic region dominate the literature. This hinders the generalizability of findings in different regional contexts. In the future, more research is needed on how sustainability-driven wood construction value-chains are successfully shaping up in different geographical regions, and how they could challenge the dominant concrete-based construction regime.

“It all depends on the project”—A business ecosystem in residential wooden multistory construction in Finland

“…This finding suggests great sensitivity to change management skills in development of the WMC BE. The findings thus contribute to understanding the critical role of business collaboration in enabling innovation within WMC market development as noted in existing literature (e.g., Nordin et al, 2010;Gosselin et al, 2018;Toppinen et al, 2019;Riggio et al, 2020;Jussila et al, 2022).…”

“…We note that the objective of this qualitative interview study is not to present generalizable results of the Finnish WMC case or beyond it, but to understand the BE from the value creation perspective in the context of actual projects. Rationale for this study is given by the need to enhance the efficiency and sustainability of the construction sector, and acknowledging the increasing expectations towards the businesses to make changes in the dominating construction practices (O'Neill and Gibbs 2014; Jussila et al, 2022). Due to the limited temporal data and qualitative approach used in the study, it is, however, difficult to assess in any absolute terms the significance of the various business ecosystem participants and their mutual influencing in regard to the development and market diffusion of WMC.…”

“…Also according to Švajlenka and Kozlovská (2020), the use of panel wood-based systems, which are an example of off-site technology, is considerably more efficient than using on-site technology. Slowly but steadily, WMC business has gained higher impetus as an emerging alternative to replacing the concrete-based construction regime in the Nordic area (Franzini et al, 2021;Jussila et al, 2022).…”

Is the Timber Construction Sector Prepared for E-Commerce via Instagram®? A Perspective from Brazil

“…Therefore, timber buildings have been gaining increasing global attention since some authors, for example, De Araujo et al [23,24], Petruch and Walcher [25], Toivonen et al [26], and Jussila et al [27], have confirmed its up-and-coming market status. Other relevant studies discuss construction supplies [16,[28][29][30], identification of different timber construction techniques [31][32][33][34][35], forecasts of market trends [36][37][38], and evaluations of market potential for specific construction techniques [39][40][41].…”

Substitution impacts of Nordic wood-based multi-story building types: influence of the decarbonization of the energy sector and increased recycling of construction materials

“…Replacing emission-intensive raw materials with wood in the construction sector is considered a potential option to decrease embodied GHG emissions [ 34 ]. Wood construction is expected to face positive market prospects, which are at least partly driven by claims of its superior environmental performance (e.g., [ 21 , 32 ]). Wood construction has a long tradition in countries with substantial forest resources and forest industries, such as the Nordic countries.…”