University of Michigan School for Environment and Sustainability (SEAS) researchers led a new study that can help show builders and city planners how to minimize the materials they need to accommodate the planet's future population.

"How we plan cities today will shape their material demand for decades ," said Jinchao Song, the lead author of the study and a U-M research fellow at SEAS. "Using materials more efficiently can help cities accommodate future population growth while reducing the emissions associated with construction. If we use less material, we will have less energy consumption and carbon emissions."

In the study, published in the journal Nature Cities, Song and colleagues analyzed 606 million buildings worldwide using satellite imagery, geospatial data, and building-material information. They found that cities with dense, uniformly short buildings use materials most efficiently while providing more floor space per person.

While the study reveals important new considerations for optimizing materials use, builders and city planners will have to weigh those against the potentially competing goal of land use optimization. For example, although taller buildings use more steel than shorter buildings, they can also accommodate more people within a city’s existing footprint, which may be more desirable or necessary.

Benjamin Goldstein, assistant professor at SEAS, is a co-author of the study.

Study: Weighing over 600 million buildings globally reveals stark disparities and material-efficient urbanization pathways

Read the full press release on the Michigan News website.