Multicriteria decision approach for climate-adaptive cross-laminated timber-wall assemblies: energy, carbon and cost-based evaluation

To mitigate building-related environmental impacts, it is crucial to evaluate the performance of innovative materials such as cross-laminated timber (CLT), which is increasingly adopted worldwide and noted for its negative carbon footprint, particularly in terms of energy and cost efficiency. Across six pilot provinces representing distinct climate zones in Türkiye, a holistic evaluation was conducted of the energy and carbon emissions performance, condensation risk analysis, and associated initial investment costs of eight CLT building envelope configurations commonly used in residential construction within the global wood industry. This evaluation was carried out using dynamic building energy simulation (DesignBuilder), One Click LCA, and IZODER TS 825 software. The scenarios’ performance was assessed by comparing total energy consumption, carbon emissions, and cost, which were scaled using the min–max normalisation method. Among the eight proposed CLT wall configurations, wall assemblies using extruded polystyrene (XPS) showed a 4% reduction in energy consumption compared with rock wool alternatives in all selected provinces. Additionally, wall configurations employing 5-layer CLT exhibited a 6% decrease in energy consumption compared to those that utilised 3-layer CLT wall alternatives.