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This paper presents for the first time the results of a full life cycle assessment (LCA)¹ study for the three most common types of house in the UK: detached, semi-detached and terraced. All life cycle stages are considered, including house construction, use and demolition after 50 years. The results indicate that the use stage has the largest contribution to most environmental impacts. For example, the global warming potential (GWP)² over the 50-year lifetime of the detached house is 455 t of CO₂ eq.; 374 t CO₂ eq. of the semi-detached; and 309 t CO₂ eq. of the terraced house. Around 90% of the GWP is from the use, 9% from construction (embodied carbon) and 1% from the end-of-life waste management. A similar trend is noticed for all other impacts. Recycling the building materials at the end of life leads to an overall reduction of the impacts. For instance, the GWP reduces by 3% for the detached and semi …