2026 Material Baselines
The 2026 Material Baselines dataset is now available. This new 2026 version:
- adds and updates baseline values to reflect the latest published industry-wide data.
- follows the same methods documented in the v2025 report (see below).
- is a downloadable spreadsheet file only (not a PDF report), with new geography and versioning notes fields.
- does NOT include an updated “state of EPDs” snapshot or reflect new manufacturer EPD data. (For v2026, CLF focused on updating baselines based on new industry-average EPDs. We intend to continue to provide those bigger updates on odd-year publications, as we have in the past.)
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Summary of what’s new for v2026.
The 2026 Material Baselines include new baseline values for the following product types, based on the latest industry data as of June 2026. An asterisk (*) indicates a newly included product type for v2026.
- Clay brick
- Thin brick*
- Hot-rolled structural steel sections
- Softwood lumber: U.S. Northern*, six Canadian regions*, North America average
- Laminated veneer lumber (LVL), USA*
- Glue-laminated timber (GLT), USA*
- Mass ply panel (MPP)
- Softwood plywood: U.S. Eastern*, U.S. Western*, Canada*, North America average
- Oriented strandboard (OSB): USA*, Eastern Canada*, Western Canada*, North America average
- Wood sheathing
- Wood I-joists: USA* and Canada*
- Wood trusses: Eastern Canada*, Western Canada*
- Particleboard*
- Medium density fiberboard*
- Polyiso board insulation: by facer type (AFF, GRF, CGF) and application (roof, wall)
- Cellulose dense-pack insulation* and cellulose loose-fill insulation
- Stone cladding*
- Asphalt shingle roofing system*
- Solid wood flooring* and engineered wood flooring*
- Natural stone flooring*
Ringraziamenti
Most of the content in this document was developed during the 2023 and 2025 CLF North American Material Baselines projects. See a full list of still-relevant acknowledgments in the 2025 CLF North American Material Baselines Report.
Diritto d'autore
Published under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Latest revision: 7/20/2026
Autori
The following individuals from the Forum sulla leadership del carbonio (CLF) authored this report.
- Brook Waldman, Low-Carbon Products Lead, CLF
- Rachelle Habchi, Low-Carbon Products Lead, CLF
- Jordan Palmeri, Low-Carbon Products Senior Manager, CLF
Citazione
Waldman, B., Habchi, R., and Palmeri, J. (2026). 2026 CLF North American Material Baselines: Table of Values and Documentation Spreadsheet. Carbon Leadership Forum.
2025 Material Baselines
The CLF North American Material Baselines Report provides a snapshot of the state of environmental product declarations (EPDs) for North American-produced building materials. This report includes:
- Background and methodology
- CLF Baselines (industry-average embodied carbon values)
- Detailed results by material category
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The 2025 CLF North American Material Baselines project continues the work of and builds upon previous CLF Material Baselines reports. This report aims to support decision-makers by providing:
UN methodology for:
- categorizing products for appropriate embodied carbon comparisons;
- collecting and processing embodied carbon data from EPDs; and
- assessing data sources for their industry representativeness and estimating industry-average embodied carbon values (i.e., “baselines”) per product type.
Category results, Compreso:
- a “state of EPDs” snapshot of North American construction product EPD GWP data; and
- a set of CLF baseline GWP values or “CLF Baselines” that represent an estimate of industry-average GHG emissions for construction materials manufactured in North America. Their primary uses are:
- a basis of comparison; a reference point against which individual products can be evaluated; and
- default GWP intensity values for project- or assembly-scale modeling.
2025 CLF Material Baselines for North America Report
Ringraziamenti
The authors would like to thank several individuals for their contributions.
University of Washington Life Cycle Lab (UW-LCL) data advisors. Milad Ashtiani, UW-LCL Research Engineer, led our data extraction process and supported our data cleaning by developing an initial framework and reviewing later iterations. Monica Huang, UW-LCL Research Engineer, supported data curation, document layout, and data visualization.
CLF staff. Meghan Lewis, CLF Program Director, supported the project through funding acquisition, review, and editing. Sindhu Raju, CLF Program Assistant, supported the publication production and data visualization.
Diritto d'autore
The 2025 CLF North American Material Baselines Report is published under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0).
Latest revision: 12/19/2025
Latest revision: 12/19/2025
Autori
The following individuals from the Forum sulla leadership del carbonio (CLF) authored this report.
- Brook Waldman, Low-Carbon Products Lead, CLF
- Rachelle Habchi, Low-Carbon Products Lead, CLF
- Jordan Palmeri, Low-Carbon Products Senior Manager, CLF
CRediT authorship contribution: Writing — original draft: B.W. and R.H.; Formal analysis: R.H. and B.W.; Writing — review and editing: J.P. and B.W.; Methodology: B.W., R.H., and J.P.; Visualization: B.W.; Conceptualization: B.W. and J.P.; Project Administration: B.W.
Citazione
Waldman, B., Habchi, R., and Palmeri, J. (2025). 2025 CLF North American Material Baselines Report. Carbon Leadership Forum.