Toward Sustainable Construction Development Using Earth-Based Materials: Progress and Challenges

Earth has been used as a construction material for thousands of years and is now receiving renewed attention as a building material with minimal environmental effects. This study explores the development of earth-based construction, with particular attention to rammed earth, from sustainability, engineering, durability, and practical application perspectives. Earth construction techniques, including rammed earth, cob construction, compressed earth blocks, adobe, and wattle and daub, are discussed together with their social, environmental, technical, and economic benefits. In addition, this study reviews international standards and guidelines related to material properties, soil selection, durability, structural design, energy performance, and indoor environmental quality. The results show that earth-based materials can reduce embodied energy, transportation demand, carbon emissions, and construction waste while offering high indoor comfort, long service life, sufficient thermal mass, and recyclability. Although earth-based construction has several advantages, its wide application is still limited because of low tensile capacity, construction limitations, moisture-related deterioration, cracking, and varying soil properties. Furthermore, projects from Malaysia, Japan, and China prove that careful material selection, modern compaction methods, and proper structural detailing can substantially increase the performance of rammed earth. The overall performance of rammed earth mainly relies on consistent design standards, durable low-carbon stabilization methods, and improved structural and seismic performance.