Finnish young adults’ perceptions of the health, well-being and sustainability of wooden interior materials

Wood as a renewable construction material presents positive human health, well-being and sustainability-related features. Several studies have indicated its lower carbon footprint compared to the main alternative construction materials and its physiological and psychological characteristics have positive impacts on human health. The objective of this study is to investigate how young adults perceive the health, well-being and sustainability impacts of wooden interior materials. The findings from the four focus groups indicate that generally the image of wooden materials is positive although some concerns were identified. Further, wood as an interior material is perceived to have mainly positive psychological impacts on human health and well-being. From a sustainability perspective, participants recognized both negative and positive impacts of wooden materials mainly relating to environmental sustainability. Findings also revealed that although participants appreciate health and sustainability in the contexts of housing and particularly interior materials, still the materials' appearance and the financial situation of young participants' households dictate their criteria for choosing housing. The study results suggest that positive health impacts of wood, as well as its broader sustainability impacts, should be better acknowledged and promoted more broadly in society. This could result in greater appreciation towards wood and wooden materials among consumers.Peer reviewe

Intermediaries to accelerate the diffusion of wooden multi-storey construction in Finland

Intermediaries can potentially help reduce institutional lock-ins that slow down sustainability transitions by influencing policy processes, because of their connectedness and often high level of legitimacy. In this paper, we analysed intermediaries seeking to accelerate the diffusion of wooden multi-storey construction (WMC) in Finland, their roles and engagement in policy processes. Increasing the use of wood in construction has high policy support nationally, backed up with climate and forest policies. Yet, market diffusion has been slow. The data consist of qualitative interviews of intermediaries and other actors, participatory observation and a review of secondary materials. The results reveal a complex set of intermediaries, including systemic, niche and regime-based ones. The intermediaries are characterised by multiple goals, partly overlapping roles and means of policy influencing. The low degree of coordination among the intermediaries and the differences in their agenda for transition are critical challenges which limit the effectiveness of their actions.Peer reviewe

Future export markets of industrial wood construction – A qualitative backcasting study

The forest sector can play a major role in the transformation to a sustainable bioeconomy, driven by climate change, population growth, and accelerated urbanization. However, in most contexts, the industrial wood construction markets, as a promising field for sustainable bioeconomy, are still at a niche level. The analysis in this study concerns the preferred future export markets for industrial wood construction for the Finnish wood construction industry, as viewed by a panel of industrial, policy and academic experts. The aim is to identify promising export markets for Finland, and to identify required pathways by 2030. A qualitative participatory backcasting method was applied to explore the future visions of the industrial wood construction (IWC) sector and its export markets, as well as the pathways from the current towards the envisioned future. Thirty-five experts formed a panel which produced five visions of the development of industrial wood construction sector exports from Finland, covering the period 2020-2030. All the visions foresaw that the domestic market needs to develop first, to build up the competencies needed to fuel the growth in the exports. Asia, particularly China with its rapidly growing markets, and Europe, with its growing sustainability awareness, commonly appeared as the most promising areas for export growth. The resulting visions differed in terms of export portfolios, varying from more traditional wood materials and products to product-service-solutions. The policy measures identified to accelerate the envisioned growth included harmonization of product and building standards and regulations in the Nordic region and beyond, developing the educational base, and using of digital solutions in building new networks and communication in the IWC sector.Peer reviewe

Planning for wooden multistorey construction - insights from Finland's municipal civil servants

Municipalities across Finland are promoting wooden multistorey construction as a low-carbon alternative for building construction. However, do attitudes towards implementing these alternatives stem from the opportunity to reduce carbon emissions or because these alternatives are perceived to improve local economies? This research employs a survey to collects the attitudes of Finnish municipal civil servants towards implementing wooden multistorey buildings in their municipalities. The respondents represent a mix of administrative professionals such as planners, real estate managers, building inspectors and other strategic managerial professionals (n = 273, 8% response rate). Their responses reflect views from approximately 8% of all municipal civil servants working on municipal land use and planning issues during 2019. The findings reveal attitudes towards implementing wooden multistorey buildings are engendered by fulfilling ecological development, economic development, technical quality and output efficiency goals. Furthermore, comparing municipal planners to other municipal administrators reveals dissimilar planning logics. Municipal planners holistically prioritize the project's ecological and economic development outcomes. Other administrators chiefly prioritize economic development outcomes. Hence, some municipal administrators may value wooden multistorey construction primarily as an activity to improve municipal vitality rather than as a holistic spatial planning solution. Future research should identify whether these divergences lead to planning tensions within municipal administrations.Peer reviewe

Vuokra-asunto Helsingissä sijoituksena ja kotina. Vuokranantaja- ja vuokralaiskyselyn tulokset

Julkaisussa esitellään tuloksia tutkimuksesta, joka selvitti Helsingin vuokramarkkinoiden toimivuutta sekä vuokralaisten että vuokranantajien näkökulmasta. Tutkimus rajoittui vähemmän tutkittuihin markkinavuokraisiin eli muihin kuin valtion tukemiin arava- tai korkotukivuokra-asuntoihin, joiden merkitys etenkin kaupunkiseuduilla on suuri.  Selvitys tuo tietoa myös yksityisten vuokranantajien tuotto-odotuksista ja vuokraustoiminnan kokemuksista. Raportissa etsitään vastauksia mm. seuraaviin kysymyksiin: Millaisia ovat vuokra-asuntojen kysyjät, ja mikä on vaikuttanut vuokra-asunnon valintaan asumismuodoksi? Millaisia ovat vuokra-asukkaiden taloudelliset mahdollisuudet? Millaisia asuntoja halutaan käytettävissä olevilla tuloilla? Onko asuntojen varustetaso tarkoituksenmukainen? Kuinka suunnitelmallista toimintaa asuntosijoittaminen on? Millaiseen asuntoon vuokranantajan kannattaa sijoittaa

The future of wooden multistory construction in the forest bioeconomy : a Delphi study from Finland and Sweden

The rise of wooden multistory construction (WMC) in the Nordic countries has turned out to be the most evident construction-related new business opportunity in the emerging bioeconomy. Based on earlier literature, the future growth prospects for the rise of WMC are rooted in the concerns regarding environmental issues, as witnessed in a plethora of studies focusing on carbon footprinting. But do new (performance-based) regulations ‘favor’ WMC or do they give a more ‘just’ comparison of alternative building concepts? Therefore, more information is needed on the role of growing environmental awareness and preferences for wood as a renewable and recyclable material in the markets. Our paper presents results from a two-round Delphi study focusing on the relative strength and perceived interplay between likelihood and the desirability of environmental concerns in driving WMC in Finland and Sweden. Using qualitative analysis of expert interviews in the first Delphi round, the issues related to sustainable development appear to have growing importance in the marketplace. However, the panelists perceive that the emphasis on sustainability is mainly driven by the changing regulation reflecting societal needs, and only few experts saw it as echoing directly from changing individual consumer needs. In the second Delphi round, implemented with an online survey, the likelihood and desirability of sustainability as a megatrend in housing was perceived to gain further impetus toward 2030, both in the form of consumer demand for sustainable living and wood construction as a modern way of living. However, future research is needed to get a better understanding on the strength and scope of these drivers.fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

Collaboration and shared logic for creating value-added in three Finnish wooden multi-storey building projects

Increasing societal interest towards sustainable and low-carbon materials contributes to demand for wood-based materials and modern solutions for urban construction. Wooden multi-storey construction (WMC), however, is a relatively new phenomenon in the construction business, and collaborative business models in projects that adopt such novel building techniques are yet to develop. Shared logic is a key concept shaping the development of well-functioning business ecosystems, even though actor priorities may vary between the WMC business ecosystem members. This study examines the applicability of business ecosystem concept based on actor perception involved in three Finnish WMC projects. The results suggest that elements from the business ecosystem thinking can be identified in all the cases. Moreover, network collaboration created benefits to the ecosystem, such as reference value and new insights from research and development. For some companies, engagement in the business ecosystem created financial and employment benefits, while some interviewees perceived these projects also to create immaterial value, such as awareness on sustainability issues in their business, marketing gains, or in the form of mutual learning effects.Peer reviewe

"It all depends on the project"-A business ecosystem in residential wooden multistory construction in Finland

Using wood in multistory apartment construction (WMC) has a climate-positive advantage with buildings acting as long-term carbon storage. Business ecosystem (BE) development around WMC is needed to accelerate the adoption of wooden materials in the conservative construction industry. As the business actors around WMC are essentially different from those using other building materials, new knowledge must be built from the project level. This study uses a qualitative interview approach among actors from three pioneering urban building projects to address their perceptions of building with wood regarding a project-based BE. Based on the thematic analysis, sources of both tangible and intangible value creation were found to arise from building with wood. A higher degree of prefabrication associated with WMC was seen in all projects to influence the reorganization of logistics, enabling faster building processes and lean material use. No strong sustainability-driven culture could be identified in any of the projects. Results further flag the sensitivity and importance of management and coordination skills in targeting improvements of the construction business based on WMC. In the bigger picture, there is still room for further research at regional and global level on business model changes in building with this renewable and recyclable material.Peer reviewe

Institutional and policy frameworks shaping the Wooden Multi-Storey Construction markets : A comparative case study on Austria and Finland

In the urbanizing society faced with the climate change challenge, wood has major potential as a low-carbon and renewable construction material. Yet, Wooden Multi-storey Construction (WMC) remains a niche even in countries with rich forest resources. This paper compares the institutional and policy setting and assesses the WMC growth prospects in Austria and Finland, based on expert interviews, Delphi surveys, and the review of secondary materials. Clear differences were detected in the policy frameworks and institutional settings between the two countries. The Austrian fairly informal and largely private sector driven approaches to promote the growth of the WMC sector seem to have had a rather similar effect on the markets, as the formal policy measures, typically driven by the public sector in Finland. In both countries, the interviewed experts suggested additional, but partly different, policy measures and institutional changes to accelerate WMC market diffusion. In spite of the increase in WMC activity within the past ten years, the WMC market share is likely to remain rather low by 2030 in both countries, as the institutional frameworks are not expected to change abruptly. However, the future market prospects appear to be somewhat more positive in Finland compared with Austria.Peer reviewe

FASCIA Method in the Assessment of Lymphocyte Mitogen Responses in the Laboratory Diagnostics of Primary Immunodeficiencies

Peer reviewe