In this study, the cost and carbon dioxide footprint of reinforced concrete walls and lightly reinforced concrete walls are compared. The reinforced concrete walls are designed according to EK2 and the lightly reinforced walls are designed by using the software tool CEN-Wall. The purpose of this study is to highlight the contingent potential of lightly reinforced walls which is fairly unknown. The test was conducted on 20 different walls located on ten different stories in a model inspired by a real construction project. It was found that in every case where lightly reinforced concrete walls was possible the lightly reinforced prototype reduced the cost by 19,6% and the carbon dioxide emissions by 8,5% compared to the reinforced concrete wall. The degree of utilization of the total moment capacity was between 15,9-27,1% for the reinforced wall design, which can be interpreted as a waste of reinforcement. By designing walls, when it is possible, as lightly reinforced instead of normally reinforced both cost and the carbon dioxide footprint can benefit, which will contribute to a more sustainable construction