Building Area Projections
A description of the sources of building area projections in the United States from 2025-2050
Building Area projects follow a similar methodology to the CLF's Washington State Carbon Emissions Estimation: 2025 - 20501. Commercial building projections were developed based on “new additions” to building stocks from the Energy Information Administration (EIA)ʼs Commercial Sector Key Indicators and Consumption2. Residential building projections were developed based on the projected building stock from the EIAʼs Residential Sector Key Indicators and Consumption and decay rates3. Area projections were subdivided into different scales of buildings in order to enable users to model policies that cover buildings that meet certain size criteria, similar to how policies work in practice. For example, a user can model a policy that is applicable only to commercial buildings that are greater than 50,000 square feet.
In the following sections, new construction and existing building stock areas can be reviewed per year. State-level estimates are generated by adjusting the national projections using the percent share of population by state using census data. Options are also given for users to enter a custom population (to enable modeling of a city or municipality), which would also be modeled as a share of the US area projections dataset.
Projected New Construction Areas
The projected new construction areas at the national scale, and based on the building area projection method, can be visualized below by selecting a year from the dropdown selector.
| Typology | Area |
|---|---|
| Commercial buildings less than 10,000 sqft | 49.3 |
| Commercial buildings between 10,000-25,000 sqft | 42.8 |
| Commercial buildings between 25,000-50,000 sqft | 37.7 |
| Commercial buildings between 50,000-100,000 sqft | 41.4 |
| Commercial greater than 100,000 sqft | 89.6 |
| Multifamily Residential buildings with 2-4 units | 4.18 |
| Multifamily Residential buildings with 5+ units | 31.9 |
| Single family residential buildings less than 1,500 sqft | 71.6 |
| Single family residential buildings greater than 1,500 sqft | 144 |
Existing Building Stock Areas
The projected existing building stock areas at the national scale, and based on the building area projection method, can be visualized below by selecting a year from the dropdown selector.
| Typology | Area |
|---|---|
| Commercial buildings less than 10,000 sqft | 2,060 |
| Commercial buildings between 10,000-25,000 sqft | 1,790 |
| Commercial buildings between 25,000-50,000 sqft | 1,580 |
| Commercial buildings between 50,000-100,000 sqft | 1,730 |
| Commercial greater than 100,000 sqft | 3,740 |
| Multifamily Residential buildings with 2-4 units | 608 |
| Multifamily Residential buildings with 5+ units | 4,660 |
| Single family residential buildings less than 1,500 sqft | 4,900 |
| Single family residential buildings greater than 1,500 sqft | 9,880 |
Sources
- Jensen, A., Chafart, M., Raju, S., & Lewis, M. (2025). Washington State Carbon Emissions Estimation: 2025 - 2050. Carbon Leadership Forum.
- US Energy Information Administration. (2024a). Commercial Building Energy Consumption Survey. Census region,number of buildings and floorspace, 2018. https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/data/browser/#/?id=5-AEO2023&cases=ref2023&sourcekey=0
- US Energy Information Administration. (2024b). Residential Sector Key Indicators and Consumption. https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/data/browser/#/?id=4-AEO2023&cases=ref2023&sourcekey=0