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Notes -
There have been various attempts to produce carbon-light concrete (or some similar replacement) but as far as I'm aware they are all decidedly inferior as a construction material.
Part of the problem with climate change is that reducing emissions gets harder and harder the farther you go: there's low-hanging fruit like coal-fired power generation which basically has no downsides to eliminating, but every element after that becomes more difficult. You need concrete and steel to build the hydro dams and nuclear reactors and train lines you want. You need oil to produce food and clothes and electric cars. Plastic is universal because it is universally useful. Our entire modern existence and quality of life is rooted from fossil fuels and so it's very difficult to pull out the bottom Jenga piece without the tower falling over.
Well, except for the fact that people don't like to shiver in the dark and every other method of generating baseload power is also opposed by environmentalists (and the renewables tend to get opposed as soon as they appear to become practical)
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