Citation: Iuorio, O.; Gigante, A.; De Masi, R.F. Life Cycle Analysis of Innovative Technologies: Cold Formed Steel System and Cross Laminated Timber. Energies 2023, 16, 586. https://doi.org/10.3390/ en16020586 Academic Editors: Umberto Berardi and Davide Borelli Received: 11 November 2022 Revised: 26 December 2022 Accepted: 27 December 2022 Published: 4 January 2023 Copyright: © 2023 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/). energies Article Life Cycle Analysis of Innovative Technologies: Cold Formed Steel System and Cross Laminated Timber Ornella Iuorio 1, * , Antonio Gigante 2 and Rosa Francesca De Masi 2 1 School of Civil Engineering, University of Leeds, Leeds LS2 9JT, UK 2 DING—Department of Engineering, University of Sannio, 82100 Benevento, Italy * Correspondence: o.iuorio@leeds.ac.uk; Tel.: +44-0113-343-2294 Abstract: Reducing the embodied and operational energy of buildings is a key priority for construc- tion and real estate sectors. It is essential to prioritize materials and construction technologies with low carbon footprints for the design of new buildings. Off-site constructions systems are claimed to have the potential to deliver a low carbon build environment, but at present there are a lack of data about their real environmental impacts. This paper sheds lights on the environmental performance of two offsite technologies: cold formed steel and cross laminated timber. Specifically, the environmental impacts of a CFS technology are discussed according to six standard impact categories, which includes the global warming potential and the total use of primary energy. The study is based on a detailed cradle to gate life cycle analysis of a real case study, and discusses the impacts of both structural and non-structural components of CFS constructions. As a useful frame of reference, this work compares the environmental impacts of 1 m 2 of walls and floors of CFS technology with those of cross laminated timber, which is spreading as innovative off-site technology for the development of nearly zero energy buildings, and a conventional reinforced masonry technology, which is largely adopted in the Italian construction sector. The paper concludes with the necessity to optimize structural systems to reduce the overall embodied carbon impacts. Keywords: life cycle analysis; cold formed steel; cross laminate timber; net zero; embodied carbon; greenhouse gases 1. Introduction The built environment is accountable for 42% of the EU’s total energy consumption and for about 35% of the greenhouse gas emissions [1]. There is an utmost urgency to reduce the carbon footprint of both existing constructions and new buildings. Numerous European policies and legislations have been recently emanated to advance and support the environmental sustainability of the construction sector. They promote the adoption of life cycle assessment used from the early stage of the design process to critically evaluate and optimize the use of material and guide towards the adoption of construction systems, processes and materials having lower environmental impacts, minimized waste and mini- mized water consumption. The trend is to move towards mandatory reporting of carbon emissions in the build environment, along with limiting embodied carbon (EC) emissions in projects. The life cycle assessment (LCA) of a building includes embodied energy (EE) and operational energy. Operational energy typically has a larger impact on the total life cycle energy of a building over long lifetimes. However, as the operational efficiency of new buildings is improved, the relative significance of the embodied impacts of construction materials and processes increases [2]. Therefore, for buildings having short life-time span, the impact of embodied carbon over their full life-cycle impact is extremely significant [3]. In recognition of this, significant attention is now being paid to the quantification and reduction of the embodied carbon impacts of construction products. In the most complete form, the Energies 2023, 16, 586. https://doi.org/10.3390/en16020586 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/energies