Business Daily — How Modular Homes Are Rebuilding Portugal’s Ruins

Date: February 26, 2026
Host: Alistair Leathead (BBC World Service)

Episode Overview

In this episode, host Alistair Leathead investigates the growing trend of modular wooden homes in rural Portugal. The episode explores how these prefabricated structures are revitalizing abandoned land and tackling the housing crisis, while offering a sustainable solution in the face of labor shortages and climate concerns. Listeners hear perspectives from leading architects, Portuguese manufacturers, and Swedish developers, uncovering economic, environmental, and social implications of this “wooden house revolution.”

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Return of Wood as a Building Material

• Shift from Industrial Era: Traditionally, wood was the primary building material until the Industrial Revolution, which repurposed it mainly for fuel.
  • “The Industrial Revolution changed the status of wood from the world’s best building material to fuel, to make steel. We’ve woken up and realized that we have this miraculous material that can hoard carbon instead of produce it.” (Prof. Alex de Rijke, 01:34)
• Environmental Appeal: Modern wood construction is recognized for its carbon storage capabilities, contrasting with carbon-intensive steel and concrete.

2. The Rural Housing Crisis & Modular Solution

• Portugal’s Land Patterns: Rural Portugal faces depopulation due to inheritance laws and urban migration, leaving scattered plots with ruined houses ripe for redevelopment.
  • “This part of Portugal is quite remote...it’s left many small plots like this unoccupied and often with a ruined house on them.” (Alistair Leathead, 03:00)
• Prefabricated Advantage: Modular homes built in factories are both quicker and cheaper due to centralized labor and minimized on-site delays.
  • “With the labor shortage, it’s easier to have people that are working here and living nearby.” (Amaro Santos, Joular, 12:03)
  • “Modular houses ready built in factories are cheaper and quicker solutions to a housing crisis.” (Alistair Leathead, 02:01)

3. Architects Championing Timber

• Case Study: Prof. Alex de Rijke
  • Built his first all-plywood house decades ago and later spearheaded advances in engineered timber, especially Cross Laminated Timber (CLT).
    • “I started my career about 30 years ago...being dubbed the King of Ply because I rebuilt my mother’s house entirely out of plywood.” (Alex de Rijke, 03:36)
    • “CLT is cross laminated timber...which is planks of wood laid up in different directions...like a jumbo plywood, scaled up.” (Alex de Rijke, 06:11)
  • His experimental flat-pack “Naked House” is set to be rebuilt on his Portuguese plot using sustainable, screw-piled foundations to avoid concrete.
    • “I’ll put some screw piles in…the great invention because obviously you avoid concrete. Very high on my list of priorities. There’s too much carbon involved in concrete and steel.” (Alex de Rijke, 05:31)

4. Inside Portugal’s Modular Home Industry

• Joular — Family-run Factory (Interview: Amaro Santos)
  • Supplies hundreds of modular timber structures annually, from schools to private homes—“assembling a house in one day.”
    • “We’re going to split [a 45-meter long building] in, I guess, 15 different sections, different modules.” (Amaro Santos, 11:20)
    • “It’s cheaper for the client. I can manage quality much better here and I have them under our supervision, which is...a much higher quality, for sure.” (12:00)
  • Labor shortages push the shift towards factory building; half their clients are international buyers.
  • Houses are fitted with insulation, electrics, and sometimes furniture, ready for immediate assembly onsite.
    • “Usually these houses are assembled in one day on site because we are always installing it on top of ground screws that we put on soil with no concrete whatsoever.” (13:19)

5. Sustainability & Forestry

• Imported Materials: Due to the low quality of domestic eucalyptus, Joular imports timber mostly from Finland.
  • “It’s a shame we have to import wood...but we use mainly Finland as a provider...the certainty that we can provide to the customer.” (Amaro Santos, 14:15)
• Broader Environmental Concerns:
  • Timber's carbon storage vs. the environmental cost of forest exploitation and imports.
  • The Swedish model: strong focus on sustainable forestry, with strict tree replanting rules—now planting four trees for every one felled.
    • “I actually called the factory...how much time does it take for the Swedish forest to grow 2,000 cubic meters of CLT, which this house contains? And they said 44 seconds.” (Sandra Frank, 15:55)
    • “For each tree you take down, you have to plant a new one...today we are planting about four trees for each tree that you take down.” (Sandra Frank, 17:26)

6. Fire Safety & Insurance

• Fire Risk: 2023 wildfires reached the edge of Prof. de Rijke's land, highlighting risks in a warming climate.
  • Reed misconception: “Wood is much better behaved in a fire than, say, steel...engineered timber just chars and protects itself, just like these trees here.” (Alex de Rijke, 18:36)
• Changing Attitudes: Insurers and mortgage companies are gradually warming up to the safety and resilience of engineered wood structures.

7. Regulatory and Economic Outlook

• Legal and Bureaucratic Hurdles: Bureaucracy can slow innovation, but “regulation can also promote sustainability.” (Alistair Leathead, 19:47)
• Portugal’s Path Forward: With increasing demand, land availability, and labor shortages, the country is well-placed to expand its “wooden house revolution”—provided it invests in quality timber production.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Alex de Rijke on Building with Timber:
  “People worry about the strength of timber completely unnecessarily. If you look at Scandinavian cultures, they’ve always built in wood...temples that are one and a half thousand years old. And this is the same timber.” (06:09)
• Sandra Frank on Sustainability:
  “I realized that we didn’t question using concrete or steel, which is also materials that you take from nature, but it never grows back. It’s an ending...If we can start using growing materials instead of ending materials, that would be a lovely thing.” (16:00)
• On Fire Safety:
  “Ironically, you know, wood is much better behaved in a fire than, say, steel. You know, steel collapses suddenly at 500 Celsius, whereas engineered timber mass timber just chars and protects itself.” (18:36)

Important Segment Timestamps

• Introduction & Scene-Setting in Portugal: [01:18-03:00]
• Interview: Prof. Alex de Rijke on Timber Techniques: [03:24-08:06]
• Joular Factory Tour (Amaro Santos): [10:19-14:49]
• Sustainability Conversation with Sandra Frank (Sweden): [15:03-17:55]
• Discussion on Fire Risks and Future Outlook: [18:03-19:47]

Episode Summary

This episode provides an insightful look into how modular timber homes are revitalizing abandoned rural land in Portugal. Through vivid interviews with pioneering architects and manufacturers, listeners get an in-depth understanding of the technical, economic, and ecological forces driving the “wooden house revolution”—including the challenges of sourcing sustainable materials, overcoming labor shortages, navigating regulations, and deploying new construction techniques. The conversation ties local trends to broader lessons from Swedish forestry and European innovation, offering an optimistic, practical vision for sustainable development.