Abstract/Summary

The development housing, a basic infrastructure requirement in every country, consumes natural resources and fossil fuels. Thus not only depleting the resources but also damaging the environment by generating embodied carbon footprint, the extent of which is governed by various factors including the physical characteristics of built facility. The current study investigates the relationship between these physical factors and embodied CO2 for conventional housing construction in tropical climate. Five selected single units with different areas of construction have been evaluated. The units were redeveloped in a virtual environment by Building information modeling (BIM). Life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology with was adopted to quantify the embodied CO2 content. The variables of area, weight of materials and carbon footprint, observed a significant positive interrelationship. A 2.5 times increase in area resulted in 50% increase in carbon footprint content which ranged from 19 kg-CO2/sft to 31 kg-CO2/sft. Bricks, concrete and steel metals were top three materials with an average share of more than 80%.