Survey: Which building material/construction method have you chosen?

Now, when building a house, the CO2 remains bound because wood is used here, but not as a fuel.

Exactly, because when the tree rots after its death, a similar amount of CO2 is released as when it is burned. If you use the tree in construction, it dies but does not rot.

PS. You never reach a consensus on this topic; honestly, I can understand all the arguments.

PS. on this topic you never reach a consensus, honestly I can understand all the arguments.

Of course there are pros and cons. But in almost every discussion it is claimed that if you burn, build with, or use renewable raw materials, it is "much better," "much more sustainable," and much more ecological than oil- and gas-based technologies.

As soon as I point out that oil and gas also "regrow" but just take much longer, the conversation immediately ends. Because if the timescale matters, the argument becomes too difficult for many. What remains is just parroting some environmental lobby. Wood stove manufacturers also want to sell their products...

Exactly, because when the tree decomposes after its death, a similar amount of CO2 is released as when burning it. If you build with the tree, it dies but does not decompose.

A tree decomposes much more slowly than it burns and releases its CO2 as construction timber much more slowly than when decomposing. Here again is the time argument. If I take it slow, something renewable can also absorb CO2 that is released simultaneously. But if I burn something as fast as possible, that does not work—and then for the balance it does not matter whether I burned a tree or oil or coal. Well, not entirely: You have to kill the tree beforehand, oil and coal are already dead. And that also applies to construction timber.

Do you have?
If you seriously pursue the idea of saving CO2, anything that requires tree felling is maximally counterproductive. The only argument that is always put forward here in favor is "regrowth". Well, oil was also once trees, what I burn there also grows back – and exactly as fast as if I had burned wood.

Now with house construction, the CO2 remains bound, since wood is used here but not as fuel. Nevertheless, trees and thus CO2 sinks are removed from the environment. And newly growing trees only reach their CO2 consumption after 30-40 years. Whether this, purely considered from CO2, is better than doing ETICS, or making concrete, or digging out pumice: it is to be doubted.

So, whoever hit you can also contact me directly. The use of renewable resources being more eco-friendly than anything else is a green life lie. Before something can regrow, you first have to shave it off.

There once was a thread where the user was so convinced by the advertising promises. Renewable raw material, CO2, etc.
Yes, I have a wooden house. The building material is good. I would build again, but not from an environmental protection perspective.

A detached single-family house of that size is and remains an "environmental disgrace."

In the early 1980s, we built the exterior walls with highly thermal insulating gray stones. The insulation was in the outer third of the stone, and the layers were "glued". In addition, at that time newly on the market, triple-glazed windows from Internorm and a well-insulated top floor ceiling allow us to live very comfortably in terms of heating costs until today, formerly with a coke heating system and for the past 15 years with a pellet heating system despite harsh winters. Thanks to these insulation strips and exterior shutters, summer heat and noise also stay outside. However, noise is not an issue here in the countryside settlement anyway. We are extremely satisfied. Why do I not see such or similar stones on today’s construction sites at all?

chand1986, you don't have to convince me, I'm completely with you!

If you balance over very long periods, the influence of other CO2 sources and sinks becomes larger again and may possibly overlay the theoretical results of the wood cycle.

Anyway, this morning I fired up with (hand-sawn and chopped) wood from old disposable pallets and added 3 lignite briquettes, while the gas heating slightly additionally tempered the rooms around the living space of our solidly built rental apartment. I partly have a guilty conscience about it.

I have already taken hits here in the forum because I don't see solid wood as the ecological wonder weapon.

The philosopher's stone does not exist in any building material trade in the world – including stones that aren't even made of stone.

I go to church for faith, and the most important thing about it is that it stays in the village. Building materials are never heavenly and never hellish; they all just cook with water. One must learn to see things as things and not overload them with expectations.

Energy preserves itself, and no ozone hole can become so large that it nullifies the entire solar income again. The effort for the travel of the whole entourage of discussants alone is enough to make the ecological balance of every climate summit negative – politicians should actually have to wear the disgrace for generations because of that. Anyone who wanted to include all the hypocrites in their prayers would otherwise not get a jot of their day's work done anymore.

Consistent sustainability would, by the way, also mean that all objects of (even long-term) temporary use would have decayed at the end of their service life without requiring any destruction or reprocessing effort. But consistency is ultimately always only a philosophical concept; in practice, it is incompatible with human imperfection.

However, if one lowers one's demands – that is, to the eye level of mortal beings – and "settles" for the domestic home to carry the roof over the heads of the inhabitants with its walls, then the building material trade laughs at us like a cheerfully colorful toy store. And there, in my gray stone region, I can live peacefully fence to fence with fans of red stone and white stone.

That means: no matter what building material you use – you can never be "right" or "speak the truth" with it, but only "build" ("and that is a good thing," to quote a former governing mayor).