The building and housing sectors face the double carbon constraint. To overcome it, they must plan their exit from fossil fuels, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and adapt in order to lower their vulnerability to the impacts of climate change.
They source construction materials (steel, glass, concrete, bio-based materials, etc.) from industry, and from agriculture, which provides construction materials (biomass for construction) and energy for heating (biomass for energy).
With transport and agriculture over land use (land take and location of activities, competing with housing construction), or with manufacturing industries competing for resources (example: steel).
The tertiary sectors make up a significant share of the demand for buildings and thus control certain levers of building decarbonization.
The use of buildings and housing directly depends on oil supply, the electricity system, and the gas grid. They are also at the heart of the thorny issue of gradually dismantling the gas distribution network as consumption declines.
Scaling up energy renovation and maintaining new heating systems creates a need for additional labor and new skills, while reduced new construction has the opposite effect.
12 %
>50 %
36 million
50 %
The Shift explores all decarbonization levers: energy substitution, efficiency, and sufficiency, whatever level of technological and behavioral change is required. Pulling all available levers is a guarantee for reaching decarbonization goals.
Expanding the renovation sector through massive reorientation of subsidies and mobilization of new skills. The most energy-intensive, fossil-fuel-consuming homes are targeted first. Renovation must be global, raising all homes with an energy label above C to A, B, or C.
Replacing fossil heating with low-carbon energy sources, combined with maximum use of waste and renewable heat. Promoting low-carbon alternatives to connect 5 million collective dwellings to district heating and install heat pumps in more than 10 million homes. Use of wood and so-called Joule-effect electric heaters is limited. Secondary levers of individual sufficiency (housing surface, heating and cooling temperature, etc.) should not be neglected.
Decarbonizing construction along a trajectory close to RE2020, reinforced up to 2050. This requires reducing the use of the most carbon-intensive materials and increasing the use of bio-based materials that store carbon. These materials are also gradually used in renovations (carbon storage in insulating materials in particular), without slowing down the renovation trajectory, which remains the priority.
Taking into account ongoing trends: a gradual decline in the number of new homes built each year, in line with demographics. This comes with a sharp reduction in the share of new single-family houses, leading to a shift toward collective housing as a result of new regulations on land take.
Reflection on optimizing the existing stock: adapting housing size to household size, converting vacant or even secondary housing into primary residences, which requires upgrading them and evolving employment and territorial attractiveness.
By 2050, the housing stock should grow by about 20%, but energy consumption will be low thanks to widespread effective insulation. No dwelling is rated above C on the energy label (primary energy). To limit rebound effects from efficiency gains, communication and educational efforts will accompany renovations.
With building energy needs falling sharply, homes will be more resilient in case of constraints on fossil fuel supply (availability, price), and their climate impact will be lower.
Building-related hardship will decline sharply: building pathologies, air quality, summer comfort. Restrictions on heating in some households will no longer exist thanks to energy bill reductions. Thermal quality of housing will become a point of pride, with thermal and environmental performance becoming a central aspect of daily life (alongside access to public transport, services, green spaces, views, surface area, etc.).
Scaling up global thermal renovation requires not only additional labor but also upskilling in the sector. The number of permanent jobs in construction will decrease due to fewer needs in new housing construction, partially offset by demand in energy renovation.
