SUMMARY
- Housing Drives Demand: Research by Louisiana State University and U.S. Forest Service Southern Research Station finds housing starts are the dominant factor influencing lumber demand.
- Decline Through 2070: U.S. softwood lumber consumption is projected to gradually decrease across all scenarios, potentially dropping to ~60 million cubic meters.
- Regional Impact Varies: The U.S. South is expected to see the sharpest decline, while the Pacific Coast shows relative resilience.
  
A new study indicates that U.S. softwood lumber demand is set to decline steadily through 2070, primarily driven by weakening residential construction activity. The research finds that housing starts play a far more significant role in determining lumber demand than income levels or price fluctuations.

Analyzing quarterly data from 2000 to 2024, researchers identified a housing-starts elasticity of 0.593 for apparent softwood lumber consumption, compared with an income elasticity of 0.138 and a price elasticity of -0.212. The study was conducted by Craig Johnston, Jinggang Guo of Louisiana State University, and Jeffrey P. Prestemon of the U.S. Forest Service Southern Research Station.

The findings show that U.S. housing starts averaged 1.3 million units annually during the study period, peaking above 2 million units in 2005 before dropping sharply to nearly 0.54 million in 2010. By integrating housing activity into the Forest Resource Outlook Model, researchers found that demand projections shift from growth to a gradual long-term decline, aligning more closely with recent observed trends.

Across five modelled scenarios, U.S. softwood lumber consumption is projected to fall by 2070, with the lowest case reaching nearly 60 million cubic meters. The steepest regional declines are expected in the U.S. South, while the Pacific Coast is projected to remain comparatively resilient.


US softwood lumber consumption (left) and production (right) from 1990 through 2070. The blue dashed line shows FOROM’s older forecast, which relied on GDP growth and projects demand exceeding 100 million cubic metres by 2070. The red dashed line, with housing construction centred, drops to roughly 67 million cubic metres over the same horizon, tracking what the market has actually done far more closely. (Source: Johnston, Guo & Prestemon, 2026)

Source: USDA